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We realised that we had been in Ho Chi Minh for over a week so thought we'd better move up north (we have a 30 day visa). Next stop - Da Lat. Da Lat is a former (French) colonial mountain retreat.
We left Ho Chi Minh on the bus around 8.30am. We were told that the journey would take 5 hours. 1.30pm passed asnd we saw that we had over 100km to go! The journey actually took 8 hours in the end, I really don't know why, it was not like we were delayed (although we were stopped by the police for some reason). Coming up here reminded me a little of when we went to the Cameron Highlands - although Da Lat is a much bigger town. It is cooler here, a nice respite from the hot weather!
There are tours to do here but with our recent history, we decided not to do that and hire a moped for the day instead. Only 3 pounds for the day so worth it. There is not much to do in the town itself but it is a nice place, with a man-made lake in the middle. We set
Whilst in Dalat...
...we received a divine visitation from God. Which was nice.off to go to a museum - on the map it didn't look difficult but actually driving around here is a different matter - none of the roads are very well signed and junctions are very vague (i.e. two or three roads can branch off one place) and the roads sometime disolve into a warren of side streets, so it is very hard to work out how the sanitised map and the slightly crazed road network are related (unlike anywhere else we've rented a moped). In the end we just gave up and cruised around instead!
We went up the hills on the outerskirts of the town where we got some good views, then had a drink by the lake - very relaxing. They even have a cable car here (which we could find on the map) so we went up that to see a pagoda on the other side. Finally we stopped at the 'Crazy House', a hotel with a difference - its a massive mould concrete structure that imitates a rock and organic sort of tree house. Thats a weird explanation, but its a weird place! Very unique and we were tempted to stay a night there
Banana and Chocolate Pancakes in Dalat
Lovely Jubbly. Tell any Vietnamese Restuarant owner you are English and that's also the reply you'll get. but then decided not to (given we had already confirmed our trip to Nha Trang tommorrow, and being 30 dollars a night compared to our 6 dollars a night at the moment - it was a bit steep). Although there is not much to do, unless you go trekking, both James and I felt we could stay here for a few days as it is a good place to chill out, but we are moving on tomorrow as the journey up to Hanoi seems like it will mean quite a few long bus journeys and we still have to guarantee a few days in Hanoi to sort out our Chinese visas (and book our ticket to Nanning or wherever the heck our first stop in China will be - not sure yet).
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