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Dalat's the way to do it!
French influenced architecture here, with 'balamory' colour scheme. Roads In Vietnam: Sublime. Ridiculous.
Sublime; Once you are off the main Highways, some of the tarmac roads going up into the mountains provide Hours and Hours of virtually traffic free curves, swoops, vistas, that back home in the UK - you would at most get (Maybe? at best?) 20 Minutes of at a time.. here, they go on all day! The 125 scooters that everyone rides here are perfectly adequate power wise, as the bends are all quite tight curves so 50 - 80 KMPH is just right.
Ridiculous; Some of the 'main' roads are being re-surfaced / re-built. In particular right now Dec 2014, the road between Buon Ma Thuot and Pleiku (AH17), is approximately 85% under re-construction.. That equates to 8 Hrs riding through a construction site, Not BY or PAST a construction site, you ride THROUGH it. there is a vague attempt on some stretches to 'guide' the traffic into a single lane - that's basically for traffic heading in both directions!! where it is briefly wide enough, trucks overtake motorbikes by moving out towards you - then the insane coaches and mini vans take the opportunity to also overtake by going flat out to
The Hills are alive, with the sound of 125 motors.
Up to Dalat. Stunning scenery all the way. Just watch out for the craters on the way! get past - towards anything smaller approaching from the opposite direction! You just have to get out of the way, anyway you can, horns are blaring constantly.
So, the safest option for bikes, is to weave through the construction traffic as much as possible, only avoiding where they are actually just laying the tarmac.
This is NOT fun! the road surfaces are atrocious, you have to go as fast as you dare to keep up with the traffic flow, staring hard at the ground about 20ft in front of you to weave past the worst of the 'pot holes', craters, 'drop-offs' and when you are forced into the oncoming traffic you learn to split your vision between the floor and the coaches and vans hurtling towards you at 50 - 70 MPH bouncing wildly from side to side horns blaring!
Fortunately, it was pretty much just one day of 'hell', more than counterbalanced by the 5 Days of 'Heaven' that just got better and better the further up the Ho Chi Minh Highway I travelled. North of Pleiku, through Kon Tum and onwards to Kham Duc - the roads were utterly brilliant. For 2 - 3 Days
you are riding through 'Coffee country' (See pics below) where coffee is grown from individually planted seeds (Pics) through to fully grown and harvested beans that are dried out EVERYWHERE. Often out onto the roads, sometimes (Pic enclosed) completely covering town streets. The roads, pavements, any 'flat' area around almost all of the dwellings (Houses and shacks) are covered in drying beans and husks.
Tourist 'free': For nearly 3 Days, I didn't see a single 'Western' face. You notice everyone staring at you - but then they were ALL so friendly, curious, smiling, helpful, just lovely people! Two 'offers' of marriage later.. Ahem, one by an grandma with the 'weathered' complexion of a favourite pair of boots, the other - a Lady called Wee (I'm pretty sure that's not how it's written) offered me her Daughters hand in marriage (Much to the daughters horror!) but I managed to laugh it off, I think! and we parted with huge smiles and waving all round (Pic enc).
Anyway, the day wasn't Monday, which is relevant (I think!) as on Monday in the hills, I passed 8 Weddings at various stages of progression. Towards the end of that day, the ceremonies
obviously involve a lot of drinking, as the lads tearing off on their bikes and weaving all over the road were hilarious and terrifying in the same measure.
Big Country, small world: Starting to come down from the hills entering Kham Duc, I came across the first 'Western Faces' fellow travellers 'Dalith and Aydin' from South Germany, also looking for a room for the night. We checked out 3 'Hotels' (Its a small town), bargained hard and got decent rooms for 200,000 VNM Dong (Approx $9 / room).
Had some of the best & cheapest 'street / cafe' food for a while for approx $4 each inc beer! Then, the following morning, despite setting off separately, ended up meeting again another 80KMS along the road, met again in Hoi An, departed separately (I put my bike back on a train to Saigon & travelled to Hue by trian) then promptly met up again on the road into Hue!
Hoi An is just sooooo pretty! Amazing food, wonderful sights, a bit 'touristy' now but so unbelievably pretty, that can be overlooked. The train Journey to Hue is spectacular beyond belief. The railway is cut precariously halfway up the
Main highway road repairs, 'Nam style
8 hrs of this to Pleiku got tiring, and filthy. mountainside that sweeps down to beautiful beaches and bays (Inc 'china' bay where the Americans first made land in the Vietnam war I believe). There would be photo's - but rain, low cloud, dark grey skies and 'mucky' train windows all conspired against me on that day.
Hue has had much of the same weather wise. Very nice Hotel (Moonlight Hotel), but the main draw here; the 'Citadel' Home for the Rulers of Vietnam for many centuries is not so impressive in the drizzle I'm afraid, and about half of the 'Major' buildings in the complex are undergoing restoration at the moment.
The Vietnamese People: I've included a few shots (I've taken loads!) of just some of the people I've met so far during this trip, lovely, smiling usually happy people. I would be very happy to return, and to those of you considering a visit - Do it! I will be back!
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