Da Lat

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We boarded a very average coach to take us to Da Lat, both hungover and annoyed about my phones disappearing act. The drive was going to take us 6 hours and the first hour was pure hell. Winding and bumpy roads on a coach whose suspension felt like it hadn't been serviced since the Americans left! However, a bit of noodles and some coke at a service station soon had me on my way again. I could then appreciate the amazing mountain views outside the window! The road was barely wide enough for the bus so there were times it felt like a death bus, but the rolling mountains and deep forested valleys made that feeling completely worthwhile.

Da lat itself was a very typical Vietnamese town with chaos and motorbikes everywhere. This was a city in which tourism was not their first priority, which was completely refreshing. Less harassment by the taxi men (tuk tuk my friend, where oo from?) and by street vendors hawking weird concoctions of Food and sewage By the smell of it. Plenty of bakeries and markets to keep you entertained for the day, with day trips to the surrounding mountains offered at all the hostels. We stayed at a hostel called Backpackers paradise which couldn't have been more dictatorial. Dogs chained up barking all night, babies crying, mothers shouting and super-thin walls made the 2 nights we spent there very uncomfortable. (Oh, and the breakfast tasted like arse aswell) But it offered us a canyoning trip that was truly unforgettable, so that was its one plus side.

The canyoning bus took us high us into the stunning mountainside with a guide who was a good mixture of Asian, weird and crazy. his harassment of the girls to find out if they were single and available for him made for an entertaining bus ride. We were then kitted out with abseil kit, shown some quick ropes and then chucked in at the proverbial deep end. The photos don't quite do justice to the scale of some of the waterfalls, but they were massive. We did 2 dry abseils, 2 very wet abseils over powerful waterfalls and these were broken up by some floating down currents and some jumps off either 7,9 or 11 metres drops into plunge pools. Sounds very tame when you put it into words, but a great experience and the group we had made the time pass very quickly. The 4m drop where the guide tells you to just let go of the rope during a particularly rough abseil will definitely stick with me.

The rest of our time in da lat was taking up with moving hostel for one last night and wandering around, eating at the restaurants. The food itself was no where near the standard of other places in vietnam but was filling and reasonably inexpensive. The new hostel had comfortable beds with divide curtains so was a good night sleep to end. Then it was onto a bus at 11am the next day to travel to Saigon/Ho Chi Minh City.

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