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Published: March 5th 2008
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We arrived on a bus from Nha Trang at around 3.30pm the first day. The bus spent nearly an hour climbing the mountain range to take us to the town of Dalat - renowned for it's French feel (it is said to be like the french Alps). We checked into our hotel (which was amazing - massage shower and modern room for only 15USD per nt!) and then ventured down to the market to have a nosey about. The market is vast - selling everything you can think of - from sweets and jams to fish and meat and flowers and jewellery.
The town itself is not that big - made up of the central market, a huge boating lake and several pineforests - there is also a radio tower that is comically shaped like a mini eiffel tower - for that extra French feel. We took a walk down to the lake after we had looked around the central market and then headed for dinner at a restaurant near our hotel.
We knew that we had to head out into the surrounding countryside and mountain top villages to truly appreciate what Dalat had to offer, so we booked
a tour for the following day. There are teams of 'Easy Riders' (men on moterbikes) offering tours around the countryside but I didn't fancy the idea of clinging on for dear life while the motorbike driver spead round dangerous bends with 100 foot drops at either side of us. So we chose the mini bus option.
Day 2 (after a feast of a breakfast - thanks Mrs Dung - Dreams Hotel) began with a pick up from our hotel at 8.30am and then a drive out to the countryside. Our first stop was to a private flower farm to see how the flowers are cultivated and sent off to the retailers throughout Vietnam.
After this we drove a little longer and then the bus pulled over to allow us to admire the views over from our high up position. After this we were taken to a coffee plantation. This was a really interesting stop - we saw the coffee plants, their white flowers with tiny seeds, then the fully grown seeds in their green shells, which our tour guide peeled open to reveal the coffee bean. I'm not a big coffee fan but it was interesting to see
their origin. Our guide told us that after Brazil, Vietnam was the second biggest exporter of coffee in the world (even Columbia were below them).
We stopped off a little further on at a rice wine factory. The guide showed us how rice wine was made (fermented) and then we all got to taste some. We also saw how mushrooms were made in small wire-net baskets the fungus grows and tiny mushroom heads push out from between the wire. In the same place we also got to taste some Green Tea.
Our next stop was to a Silk Factory. Again - another fascinating insight into how something so everyday is painstakingly made. The first thing we were shown were the grey wriggly silk worms. Then the Chrysalis. Then the cacoons the worms create, and then the human intervention. In the factory the cacoons are dipped in boiling hot water with chopsticks then forced open to remove the worm. The empty cacoon is then swished in cooler water to unravelled the threads which the women feed through the machine and spin until the cacoon is completely open. We were then shown the next stage which is where the silk
thread is manipulated to weave in and out of a machine to form a piece of cloth. Different types of silk are used to form patterns in the cloth which are then dipped in dye and hung on a line to dry. The machines looked pretty dangerous and noisy - and the work looked back breaking, but the whole process from start to finish was incredible to see.
After the silk factory we were taken to Elephant Falls - an impressive waterfall set into the mountain. We had to trek down a mountain side to get to it - but it was worth it when we got there. We ate some water melon and sat under the spray for a while - a nice way to cool off on a hot day.
We were then taken to a Pagoda down the road after this (yes - another one!). It was set in a picturesque location and had a huge white laughing buddha complete with belly and dripping with jewellery at the back of it. The Buddha had a halo which clearly lit up at night - it is an object of worship, but to be honest it looked
very tacky, and probably wouldn't look out of place on blackpool beach! We were lucky enough (again) to stumble across a bride and groom as they were having their wedding photos taken. They even invited us to have photos taken with them for the album - and the photographer filmed us as we posed with them. Surreal but an honour really.
After Lunch in DaLat we were shown around the Crazy House. Which was just that - Crazy. It is designed by a Vietnamese Architect (female) and the building work started in 1990 and is still going on. There are various wings in this 'guesthouse' which all look like they have come straight out of 'Alice In Wonderland'. Giant spiders webs, themed rooms, papier mache steps made to look like twisting branches or tree trunks. The pictures describe it better. I am not sure if we were impressed or bemused. It was certainly something different but for something which has taken so long to design and build - and by a fully qualified architect we couldn't help but feel it was a little amateurish. Anyway it was fun to explore.
Our last stop on the tour was to
a minority village just outside of Dalat. With a population of 500 and very well established houses it didn't feel too much like a minority village. Especially as pretty much all of them owned motorbikes! I think the aim of taking us their on the tour was so that we could buy from their expensive shop (cynical I know)...although he did show us into one of the 'huts' to take a look at how they cook and live.
We were dropped off back at our hotel early evening so we decided to hire some bikes and take a ride around the lake before the sun went in. We also visited the flower gardens on the way. The very last part of our day was a lovely meal at a restaurant called "Arte" which was quite posh but well worth the money. We both had Caramelised meat dishes and loved them so much that we asked the owner for the recipe. He beamed at this request and took pride in explaining every detail including ways we could adapt it to suit different ingrediants. We wrote it down and promised it would be the first meal we would cook when we
returned to the UK!
This is about it for Dalat, we had an early morning coach pick-up the following day to take us to Mui Ne. All in all it had been a nice diversion from the coastal towns we had visited until now.
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