'Spot me an Easy Rider' in Dalat

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After 2 glorious days coasting the waters of Halong Bay, we were now off to do some serious land cruising - seated on the back of a motorcycle, whizzing through the country side. Our starting point was to be Dalat, home of the Easy Riders. The Easy Riders are a Dalat home-grown concept. Essentially, english speaking guides with motorbikes, who will, for a fee, strap onto the back of their bike and drive you across Vietnam, up mountains, down valleys, into tiny villages, and of course to the compulsory 'uncle or cousin's' house. It was touted as one of those 'must does' if you really want to experience Vietnam.

Of course, we first had to find an Easy Rider. Which was no easy feat. We arrived in Dalat mid afternoon, checked into our hotel, and commenced our search for an Easy Rider. 4 hours later, we had checked out the local market, indulged in a few local snacks and even walked through a few local art galleries - yet no Easy Rider. We began sniffing our arm pits, checking for facial growths, and essentially trying to discern some reason as to why we hadn't found an Easy Rider. I was getting ready to put on a fresh pair of socks, just in case, when lo and behold - a pair of Easy Riders. Seated right outside our hotel!!! Jolly and Toothy (our pet names for these guys) had been there all afternoon apparently. Happily, we signed up for a 1 day ride, to be commenced early the next morning. One day was a bit short, but alas, that's all the time we had to spare. Jolly tried to convince us otherwise, and even Toothy joined in shaking his disapprovingly and looking concerned. But alas, a day was all we had, so they agreed to give us a 'super-compressed' view of the region.

We spent the rest of the day exploring Dalat. Dalat was popularised as the mountain retreat for rich French, back when Vietnam was a French colony. Thus, there is a reasonably noticable French influence, particularly in the local food and sweets, and even on the local accent/dialect apparently. This 'Frenchiness' explains the escargo-esque groscities sold in the market, including slimy foot-long snakes by the kilo and bullfrog - with or without puffed throat. On the flip side, the French influenced meant eclair-filled patisseries(french bakery).

That night, we headed out to one of Dalat's 'major attractions', 'The Crazy House' (SEE LINK). Described as the humble aboard of the Mad Hatter's mad inbred cousin, this crazy hotel/tourist attraction sports bizarellly decorated bedrooms and manically twisted stairwells - all clearly the result of one architect we really needed to invest in a ruler. Alas, we arrived 15 minutes after closing time - however, the kind gate keeper let us in anyway. It was rather spooky exploring the place at night - shadows combined with crazy places is bound to have that effect. Being the loving husband I am, I managed to take advantage of the spookiness to scare my pooor wife a few times. All in all, it was definitely 'interesting'.... but, definitely not mind shattering.

Next up, we went exploring through some of the smaller streets, and stumbled upon a 'local eat', run on the porch of a rather ramshackled house. A husband and wife team busily prepared tasty little muffin-pancake hybrids (see picture) served with various salty dipping sauches - they were rather thrilled to entertain a bunch of foreigners - clearly most other tourists weren't fans of the rather meager (read unwashed/crusty) conditions. Our second food stop was less successful - cold noodles served with jerky-like strips of an unidentifiable meat - possibly the pet store next door may have been an indication for the source of the meat.

We headed to bed early that night, in preparation for an early morning start with the Easy Riders. Alas, Melenie's muscles had other plans, and decided to cramp all night - a direct result of two days of canoeing. Poor thing spent the night howling, which I'm sure the hotel manager found quite entertaining.

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Photos

Little puffy pancake thingies
This was some filthy little eatery in the porch of some person's house. Reasonably tasty, but not fabulous. Still, it was a nice experience hanging out with the locals and being stared at.

Snakes by the kilo
Yummy - still alive and slithering. Freshness is the key to succulent snake meat.