Goodbye to SE Asia

Hi there...!
Been a slight delay since the last blog due to lack of time and access to PC's (and to give you all a break!!)

We left Hue and moved down the coast 4 hours to an old provincial capital called Hoi An.. another 'quaint' and relatively small coastal town. This was a nice 3 days and we deliberately didn't book any trips or tours to give us the opportunity to just chill for a minute - things had been a little hectic to say the least up till then..

Hoi An's main asset is its 'tailoring' facilities on every corner so we just couldn't resist...after 2 days and 3 visits for re-fits we walked away with a Linen suit, cord jacket and a couple of ties for me and trousers and 3 silk tops, designed by 'Rosie 'Armani'' herself.. all for the price of dinner for 2 back home..! Hopefully they won't fall apart too quickly..!

From here we had a change of plan (due to most means of travel being sold out as their New Year quickly approached..) and booked an internal flight to Ho Chi Minh City, spent one night (where, by the way, my next bout of nasty stomach 'things' began...) and then took a coach north back upto the central highlands and a place called Dalat. Advertised as a 4 hour trip this promptly took 8 hours to get there..just starting to get the hang of 'Vietnam time' as we approach the end of our 2 weeks..

Dalat is the home of local honeymooners, with its slightly reduced temperatures and fantastic mountain scenary and of course the compulsary Temples and waterfalls..! Dalat is also advertised as the mecca for delicious cakes in Vietnam - after 2 days of searching Rosie was not amused to find that either this was a complete myth or it simply wasn't 'cake season'...

We spent the 2 days with a Dutch girl and an Irish 'lass' - nice company, although embarrasing to see that the dutch girl spoke better English than all of us!

On the first day me, Rose and Mierta hired 3 bikers known locally and in the 'Bible' (a.k.a The Lonely Planet) as the 'Easy Riders'. These are a sixty strong group of English speaking local tour guides, created back in the early 90's. They're that good that people have hired them for up to 7 days and ridden all the way back to Hanoi!

We however had just the one day, but still this proved to be an unforgettable experience and moved straight into our 'top 3' for the holiday to date..

Basically we spent the day in and around Dalat, riding through the hills and visiting not just the tourist bits but some 'extras' as well. We watched locals fishing for anything that moved, then promptly throwing it live onto the fire for a quick snack. (Coincidently we weren't hungry at this point, or so we told them..) We visited a silk worm farm and watched the little blighters working their 60 legs off for the farmer and then to the factory where cacoons were unwound and processed / refined into Rosie's tops from Hoi An! As is usual nothing gets wasted, so after this the dead silkworms are dried, sold to the market and, of course, eaten!

A happy visit to a blacksmith, who was hammering knife blades on an old, disused, 90mm artillery shell casing, turned a little sad when told his oldest son had been in the fields only a few years before and found an old US grenade which went off in his hand - no more oldest son i'm afraid...oops..

After a couple of shot-glasses of the local, and potent, rice wine, we were back on the bike and wobbling home via the coffee plantations and flower growing fields.

Another great day - and our first bits of sunburn - yey! Will the British ever learn? - doubtful...

Back to Saigon (Ho Chi Minh City) for our last day and a half..

We deliberately didn't do a lot back there - just another big city really and on first impressions a lot more manic and not as nice as our first stop, Hanoi..

Monday night we boarded a flight to Melbourne and touched down around 7.00am - it was CHUCKING it down - Melbourne or Manchester?? - we had to look twice..

More from down-under next time...

Thanks folks.. hope your all well back there - and remember its not as easy as you think doing all this travelling, drinking, socialising, sightseeing, sunsoaking and having to write this blog...spare a thought for us, please guy's...(!)

Speak soon.. XX

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