February 24, 2017

OMG you should have seen the look on the night manager’s face when he saw the bikes appear. It was priceless, he had no idea that they were still in the hotel. We had bought the bags down first and lined them up against the wall, then Ralf appeared with my bike first and then his bike. Ralf and I managed to keep a straight face and loaded the bikes in the lobby. While I was loading my bike he came over and was about to move Ralf’s bike. I told him in my Mum’s “Don’t you dare do that” voice; “Please do not touch that bike, we will be loaded and leaving in five minutes.” He looked at his boss who was in the office area and said “My boss doesn’t want you to make a mark on the wall”. I almost laughed at that point but I smiled and pointed out the already dirty wall and the holes that were already there. We will be gone in five minutes! As soon as we get our passports and pay. He let go of Ralf’s bike and we were gone five minutes later.

Today we headed out of Ho Chi Minh and went to the Cu Chi tunnels. The traffic was the usual chaotic craziness that is Vietnam, it didn’t quieten down until we were almost 35 kms out of Ho Chi Minh. It was a hot day and I was drinking a lot of water. We came to a traffic light and I spotted the coconuts, it tasted soooo good.

The Cu Chi tunnels are similar to the Vin Moc tunnels, except these were dug and made primarily for the Vietcon soldiers. We parked our bikes and paid 8,000 VND for the security guard to look after them and headed into the well designed area that is Cu Chi tunnels. We had a guide who was very good and had a sense of humor. The area has been recreated to show how the Vietcon were able to fight the Americans. We were reminded that this whole area was devoid of trees during the war, none of the “huts” would have been above ground, everything was hidden.

We were showed the various booby traps that were used in the area, against the American soldiers to inflict the most damage without killing them. A psychological part of the warfare.

There were small access holes that were designed to allow the Vietnamese to access their tunnels. These tunnels range in distance about 250 kms from this area almost to Ho Chi Minh.

We were allowed to go into a tunnel which has been made bigger for the tourists to get through. I had to bend over going through it, the original tunnels were very low and narrow. This area is definitely designed for the tourists and attracts about 3,000 tourists per day. There is also a shooting range where you can pay to shoot a variety of military equipment.

It was a good trip. There are another set of tunnels north of here which may not be quite as commercial.

We are staying at a small guesthouse (Tanjas Resort) 3 kms north of the tunnels. It is owned by a German fella and his Vietnamese wife, both of them speak English and German. We were welcomed with a beer and we sat and chatted to Werner for a while. His wife made us some lunch. Although there were places to eat in the small town, he offered us a second breakfast – eggs, bacon, sausage and bread – it was lovely. We were talking about the tunnels to Werner and he mentioned that when he was making his cellar larger he connected with one of the tunnels near his house. The tunnel system is everywhere.

I am feeling rather tired today, after lunch we walked up to the main town and bought some water. Ralf then went out with Werner for a quick view of the Saigon River and a tour of the Town.

We asked Werner what they were drying on the road – medicine for traditional Asian medicine. He snorted “very healthy when they dry it on the road that the dog has pissed on”! he added.

Apparently, there is a new river crossing planned at the end of this road. This will bring tourists on a new road directly from Ho Chi Minh to this bridge and down the road 3 kms to the tunnels!! One of the tourists in our group was complaining that the bus ride was horrendous, it took almost 2.5 hours – we cycled it in the same amount of time! I guess they do need a new road to get here!

We had an excellent dinner in the guesthouse of pork chop and fries with a beer to wash it down.  The name of the guesthouse implies something much fancier Tanjas \”Resort\”.  It is a simple, clean guesthouse with an excellent host who provides good food and good conversation.

Tomorrow we will be leaving Vietnam and heading into Cambodia. The distance is about 50 kms, we have heard different reports about crossing the border and how long it might take. We have decided on a short day of riding, just in case we get held up at the border.

February 22 and 23, 2017

Ralf had a plan. He set the alarm for 6:00 a.m., went downstairs and bought the bikes up the stairs and into the room. The night security man was still asleep on the sofa and the other night security man was asleep at the desk.

The bikes are safely in the room. I was expecting to come back from our exploration of the City and be told to leave, but no, what they don’t know doesn’t hurt them.

After Ralf came back to bed we slept until the school band woke us up at 8:55 a.m. Did I mention we are next to a school, it can get quite noisy, but we were away for most of the day.

As we left the hotel the receptionist called us back and asked us if we were going to stay the two nights, we could leave without being charged any cancellation fee. We said no everything was o.k. now.

We headed out towards the river and then to the Bitexco Financial Tower which has an observation deck. The cost was 400,000 VND for two ($23.50), it was well worth the price for an excellent view of the City.

The Tower stands 262 metres tall, with a total of 68 floors. The Saigon skydeck is located on the 49^th floor which is 178 metres tall. The Financial Bitexco Tower has notable companies renting the office space – Ernst & Young, etc.

As you stepped out of the elevator the views of the City were amazing.  We really enjoy being able to go up towers and view the City\’s from this vantage point.

After, the Tower we headed up the “Walking Street” to the City Hall. The walking street is a wide boulevard, that does not have motor-scooters, motor bikes or any other motorized vehicle allowed on it.

The City hall is at the top of this street, and is a building that was built by the French, it was a very nice looking building.

We went into the Independence Palace, this was built in 1955 on the same site of the Norodom Palace built in 1858, which was built by the French.

As we left the Palace we were stopped by two young girls and asked if we knew where we were. They were misplaced. They showed me their map, it was all in Chinese characters! I showed them my map and we eventually worked out that where we were was not even on their map. I pointed them in the right direction heading towards the Vincom Shopping Centre, a large modern shopping centre.

We stopped for lunch at a “Food Court” near the Ben Thanh Market, we had a little wander around before deciding on some very good spring rolls and a draught beer.  As we sat there enjoying our spring rolls, the heavens opened and it poured with rain for about 15 minutes. It stopped raining and the sun came out again, making it an even hotter and humid day.

We then headed into the Ben Than Market, it was amazing how quickly the prices went down when you hesitated on something you might be looking at.

It was a very nice day, wandering around and taking in some of the sights and sounds of Ho Chi Minh.

The choice of food in Ho Chi Minh City ranges from American fast food restaurants (Kentucky Fried Chicken, Burger King, McDonalds), lots of pizza/Italian places, pub food, Thai, Indian restaurants and Vietnamese. You can also find the cheap food stalls all over the place. You will definitely not go hungry in Ho Chi Minh.

Thursday (our second rest day) in Ho Chi Minh City. We had a nice lie-in- no school band to wake us up this morning.

We headed out at about 9:30 for the second day of exploration. Ho Chi Minh has two sides to it the modern upscale side and the old busy quarter. The old quarter is not as old as Hanoi, the streets are a little wider and not as congested.  Although we did see our first fender-bender.

A lot of the architecture is still very much French style – the City Hall, the Cathedral, the Post Office and the Opera House are all remnants of the French colonialism.

Added to the history is the modern side to Ho Chi Minh, the buildings are glass and modern. The Tower we visited yesterday represents the up and coming Vietnam. Big shopping malls and a new transit system are all part of the new Ho Chi Min and Vietnam.

Ralf spotted this old motorbike and side car and thinks it would be a good idea if we did our next tour with one of these.  We could stuff our gear at the front of the side car and I could sit in the side car.  The owner was getting quite a lot of attention, he had been a Colonel in the army and the vehicle was Russian.

On the opposite end of the scale was this rather nice Bentley.  I think I would rather do our  next tour in one of these, with a chauffeur of course.

Today we bought Ralf a new camera! His Olympus stopped working a few days ago (again) it stopped working on our first Adventure as well. We stopped in at a big electronic store and checked out cameras. After enjoying a wander around the city again we headed back to the hotel to check out the specs on the camera and the prices in Canada. Vietnam is not known for its great deals on electronics. However, if we want to get some good photos of Angkor Wat we need a good camera. We go to Angkor Wat before we go to Bangkok, where we could get a good deal on the camera. Oh Well, we found a good camera that was on sale, and about $100.00 cheaper than in Canada. When we went to pay, they knocked of another $23.00, and gave us a very large camera/laptop bag and a 16mb card.

I think we did pretty well out of it. However, we now have extra baggage to carry around with us.

February 21, 2017

We were up way too early and at the ferry terminal at 7:30 well over an hour before we needed to be there. Fortunately, the crew were awake and we loaded the bikes and panniers on to the boat, before other passengers had arrived. We went back to the café where we could have had a cooked breakfast, at a reasonable price, but we had already had our nutella and banana sandwich for breakfast! We did have a good cup of coffee while we waited.

Ralf got a better picture of Tran Quoc Tuan, on our way to the ferry port this morning.  I am sure this is the same guy we took photos of in Hanoi.  He really shouldn\’t point, it is not good manners.

We were on the boat and away by 9:05 with the other eight passengers. It was a fairly smooth trip, as we were getting closer to Ho Chi Minh Ralf went out on the back deck and took some photos.

This beautiful wooden boat is used for dinner cruises along the river.  We were tempted but at $50.00 per person it was a little too expensive for us.  The evening package included: a show at the Water Puppet Theatre, one hours hand and foot massage and the dinner cruise.  I still cannot understand why you would add the hand and foot massage into the package!

We found our hotel fairly quickly and were horrified to learn that we could not keep our bikes at the hotel. They wanted us to leave them at the bike parking area around the corner. I tried to explain to the receptionist how expensive our bicycles were and that this was our only means of transportation. She said the motorbike parking was safe and they would give us a ticket. If the bikes were stolen they would pay to replace them. I told her that would be $7,000.00 and did she think they would pay that.  I don\’t think she believed me that the bicycles would cost that much.

She would not relent. We took our bikes around the corner and saw that it was parking on the sidewalk with a security guy in a booth. No way was I leaving Mrs SweetCheeks in an open parking lot. We took the bikes back to the hotel and parked them in front, locked and covered with the Arkel cover.

The manager arrived, I asked him, if we could park the bikes in the hotel at the back. After a lot of discussion, he said we could bring them in at night between 8:00 pm and 10:00 a.m. Better than nothing, however, when we bought them inside at 8:00, the night man told us we would have to take them out at 6:00 a.m. I will not be a happy person if I get woken up at 6:00 in the morning on my rest day.

Eventually we went up to the room, it is a small room that has waterstains on the bathroom ceiling and cobwebs everywhere. We asked about laundry – 60,000 VND per kilo. The most we have paid per kilo is 20,000! However, she did tell us where we could find a laundry – even that was expensive at 40,000 per kilo! I am not impressed with HCM.

We eventually showered and headed out to the streets. It is busy, and noisy, but the streets and sidewalks are wider than the ones in Hanoi. We got a little misplaced and found the co-op, so we picked up some beer and water.

Who knew there were so many varieties of rice?  There are thirty in this picture, we were told that the Thai rice is better than Vietnamese rice.

We stopped at a corner bar and watched the world go by for about an hour.  We saw numerous cars use this intersection as if there was a roundabout there.  One car went around two times before he decided to reverse up the one-way street.

We watched a fella saunter across the street, we gave him the thumbs up as he was so relaxed about the traffic. He asked if we knew anywhere that was quieter to stay than this area. He had just arrived and he wasn’t impressed with HCM either.

Ralf has been trying to capture the families on a bike.  This one has four – Mark referred to this as the Vietnamese Sandwich.  At least these little kiddies have helmets on, often we see them without helmets and standing in the front of the scooter.

Tomorrow we are going to explore the city a little bit further. I think we made a mistake by staying here for three nights. But we will see what tomorrow brings.  We hope to go up the tallest building in Ho Chi Minh.  It looks as though it has a big fat lip sticking out, or a diving board.  It is supposed to represent a lotus flower.

Plus a Cycle Around Town – 11.75 kms

February 20, 2017

We made it to Vung Tau, it is not the most southern most point of Vietnam, however, if we wanted to go further south by bike it is very difficult because of the Mekong Delta. We opted to go this far south and then try and get a ferry from here into Ho Chi Minh (HCM) City/Saigon.

The route today was along a very good paved road.

We took the D55 all the way into Vung Tau. We knew we had to do almost 100 kms, if we had dropped down to the coastal route we were not sure the state of the road and having to do almost 100 kms we wanted to have a reasonable road. Although, it was a nice wide road, it was still very rural in places.

One of the strange things we have noticed about Vietnam is the fact that they do not name the Town that you are entering. There is usually a large blue sign with a pictograph of buildings when you enter a town and a red stripe through the buildings to indicate you are leaving the Town, but absolutely no mention of the name of the Town.

We entered one very large town which obviously had a good economy, based on the buildings and housing, but absolutely no mention of the name. Another Town we cycled through had a lot of government buildings – again fairly well off, no name. We passed through this Town at about noon. There was either a large prison break, a large work-force going for lunch or the conscript army were on their lunch break. These young men poured out of the building in droves, wandered across the road to the street food stalls, some even got on scooters and followed us down the road to the bigger town (no name) about 5 kms down the road. They all had the same pyjama style uniform on with the name of their “company” on the back. The building they came out of looked like a military building rather than a factory building.

Throughout Vietnam there have been small road signs warning of driving too close. Today’s road signs were bigger and similar to the ones we saw in N.Z. and Australia. These are very easily understood. You drive over 100 and you will end up crippled, in a wheelchair or dead. Don’t Drink and Drive.

The last one left us a little flummoxed. It seems to indicate that if you get a scooter and a pedestrian in your sights you are good to go – more points!

We stopped for lunch at a little road-side café. These little places only sell drinks. I had made a nutella and banana bun before we left the hotel. We had our drinks and our sandwich and were good to go for another 50 kms. Shortly after lunch we pulled into a rest stop and I spotted my first wind-mill (wind turbines do not count). As most of you know Ralf and I have had an ongoing competition to spot windmills since we toured Holland in 1987. It is a silly thing, but the person who spots windmill has a drink bought them by the other person. This is not the first windmill spotted in Vietnam – Ralf spotted one in DaNang as we headed over the big bridge. Unfortunately, I forgot to write about that one and he didn’t get a photo of that one, but he did get a photo of the one I spotted.

As we entered the main road (Hwy 51) to Vung Tau, the road had beautiful plantings all the way down the middle of the highway for 20 kms. The road also gave us a divided cycle lane.

 Almost every little town has a hairdresser, this one advertises a Taylor Swift look!

When we arrived at the hotel today, we chatted to a Canadian from Vancouver who is taking the Greenline Ferry tomorrow – yeah there is a ferry running. We got all our gear up to our room and then headed out to find the ferry booking office to get our tickets for tomorrow. We missed the office on the way out and ended up cycling five kilometres past the booking office. However, we spotted this huge Madonna on the mountain.

The beach area of Vung Tau is quite nice and has a lovely park with stone statues.

There used to be three ferry companies running hydro-foils and catamarans into HCM from Vung Tau. The two hydro-foil companies have had their licenses withdrawn due to the age of the hydro-foils and lack of maintenance. For the past few days I have been trying to find out if the Greenline Ferry was still running, but couldn’t find any definitive answer. We decided to cycle here anyway. If it wasn’t running it would mean backtracking and cycling into HCM, which is reportedly to be very crazy. I am not sure what we have been cycling through up to now which hasn’t been crazy at all!!

We stopped and asked a white couple if they knew where the ferry terminal was. They had only arrived in Vietnam last night, but were much more helpful than the taxi driver we had asked! An older Australian couple, living north of Brisbane, they had just arrived and were out to explore on their own. Their daughter works here as a teacher, teaching English. Anyway, they had seen the ferry leaving the dock but couldn’t remember how far back it was. We turned around and I spotted the tiny office and we booked our tickets for 9:00 tomorrow morning. Two adults, two bikes for about $35.00 Cdn, it will take about an hour and a half. For example travelling about the same distance Vancouver to Nanaimo with bikes cost about $40.00 from Dover to Calais with two bicycles costs $63.00.

To the left of our hotel is a large Pagoda complex, Ralf went in and got some photos. 

It is always surprising when you see a Swastika.  However, it is an  ancient religious symbol originating from the Indian subcontinent, that generally takes the form of an equilateral cross with four legs each bent at 90 degrees. It is considered to be a sacred and auspicious symbol in Hinduism, Buddhism, and Jainism and dates back at least 11,000 years.  Guess what you kind find out on Google!

We went out for some street food and then an early night as we have to be at the ferry terminal by 8:30, we will leave the hotel at 8:00.

February 19, 2017

Although I wanted to be on the road early today, so that we are not cycling when it is really hot, we didn’t get moving until 8:15. We headed out of our hotel at 7:00 a.m. to find some breakfast. Most of the restaurants were closed, but we did find one little guesthouse that was open for breakfast for non-residents. The owner tried to sell us a full breakfast of juice, coffee, eggs and fruit for $100,000 VND but we didn’t want to spend over $11.00 on breakfast. We opted for the eggs and coffee for $6.76 for two.

We went back to our hotel, loaded the bikes and were on the very quiet road out of Ham Tien and heading towards Phan Thiet. We negotiated Phan Thiet like two Vietnamese pros. Weaving and bobbing among the crazy traffic and out the other side. Ralf was behind me shouting directions and I headed through. I couldn’t help laughing to myself, the traffic doesn’t phase me at all.

The weather today was a little overcast and slightly cooler. We followed the coastal road all the way into LaGi. The first 30 kms or so was on a good paved road, there were some minor hills to go up and down, but nothing too strenuous. There was one rough section of road for about 15 kms, which is always hard on the hands and bum. The last 15 kms was a mix of good paved road and little rough sections.

The first section we passed numerous abandoned resort hotels. However, new resorts were being built next door to the decaying resorts. I am not sure what the thinking is behind this. Maybe the old ones have ran their course and its time to build new, or maybe they were hit by a typhoon and its not worth rebuilding, we just don’t know.

I had to laugh at the Feng Shui Resort – obviously not working very well as half the resort was in ruins.

All the garbage is getting us down, everywhere you look there is garbage. Ralf took this photo of these beautiful carved, wooden gates and told me that behind the gates all you could see was mounds of garbage. It is really depressing.

We passed acres of dragon fruit orchards. We saw the trunk of the plant, the flower and the ripe fruit ready to pick. There were a lot of road side stalls along this road. We bought some Dragon Fruit from a stall holder, the first person wanted 10,000 for a kilo. The fruit I picked was about 500 grams, she still wanted 10,000. We said no and carried on. We found another stall, the lady wanted the same amount but she offered to cut it for us. She cut into the first one and it was rotten about 1/3 of the way down, she threw it away and picked another one, same thing, third time lucky she sliced it into quarters for us and because it weighed less than a kilo she found a small dragon fruit and insisted we take it with us.

Sometimes we feel as if we are being taken advantage of and other times you meet some really nice people, who are kind and generous.

Apart from the dragon fruit orchards there was not much to see today. A few glimpses of the ocean and a salt pond.

As we go further south the people appear to be less friendly, very few cheery hello’s today. We heard the music first, Vietnam always plays their music very loud, whether it be Karaoke or the bicycle street seller with an amplifier on his bike. Then we saw the colourful wedding venue, we got some inquisitive looks from the guests and a few waves. I am not sure how the bride and groom could hear each other say their vows the music was so loud.

We arrived in LaGie and found our hotel. We are spending more money on our hotel rooms about $20.00 per night but worth it. At least there are no large roaches in these hotels. As we cycled into Town, I noticed signs for a supermarket. After we had showered, we headed out to get some groceries. We had a quick lunch of burger and fries in the food court and then picked up some supplies. I noticed familiar Arches on the advertising! The food outlet was called Wantamela, they turned the arches upside down to make it a W. Is that trademark infringement?

Tomorrow we will be in Vung Tau and keeping our fingers crossed that one of the ferries will be running. If not we have to cycle into Ho Chi Min from Vung Tau. Ralf thinks it is an easier route to get to our hotel from the south than trying to negotiate through Ho Chi Min from the east. We have already booked our hotel in Ho Chi Min and will stay there for three days.

February 18, 2017

We were away early today at  7:45 a.m. I wanted to get away from the grubby guest house and on the road. We ate our baguette and nutella in the room and were on the road to Mui Ne/Ham Tien.

The bridge and road didn’t exist on Garmin maps, but we had checked the route last night and knew this was the way out of Town. 

I have been reading another blog, an Australian guy who did this route in 2012.  He said this road was a bit rough and paved in sections.  It is now a two-lane divided highway.

Of course the cattle herder who has been driving her cattle along this \”dirt\” track for years does not care that it is now a two-lane divided highway, she continues to drive her cattle along this road.

We figured the cattle herder and her cows were heading for this small oasis.  A lovely spot to relax and maybe wild camp, if you are interested, although possibly a little exposed as it was along the highway.

A lovely route today, primarily along the coast and away from the A1. The route was rolling hills, and with great swooping down hills.

The scenery had large sand dunes along the route where tourists used quad bikes or 4×4 jeeps to race around the sand dunes.

We passed one area where there was a large culvert going underneath the road.  Where it came out on the other side of the road, was a small \”canyon\”.  Not quite the Grand Canyon — yet!

It was hot again, and we were drinking lots of water.   We were having a water break when we spotted a group of touring cyclists. Five cyclists, that had met up over the past few days and were cycling together. A young French couple on a tandem, an older German couple and another German girl. We had quite a long chat with them, all of them are on extended trips. We will check out the German couple’s blog as they have ridden from Bangkok, through Cambodia and now are heading north through Vietnam.

Now Ralf is using the little point and shoot, he does silly things like this.

As we cycled along the road towards Mui Ne there were a lot of new resorts, and a few that didn\’t quite make it. 

We cycled through Mui Ne and headed towards a small fishing village!  The tourists are bused to this area from Mui Ne and Phan Thiet, there were buses and taxis all over the place.  As we came up to the area we couldn\’t quite see what the attraction was, until we looked down and saw the hundreds of fishing boats.

Shortly before coming into our area of Mui Ne/Ham Thien, we noticed the first bit of grafiti that we have seen in Vietnam.  It gets everywhere eventually.

We stopped along the way for an early lunch, it was the worst baguette with egg that I have had. I couldn’t even finish mine it was disgusting, a lot of hot sauce and some mystery meat pate added to it.

We arrived at our hotel at noon, but our room wasn’t ready.

I asked how long for the room to be ready and was dismayed to learn it could be an hour or two.  There is nothing worse than sitting around in sweaty cycling gear when you know there is a  hot shower waiting for you. I took a deep breath, smiled at the owner and walked towards the door, to calm myself down.  Not losing face today.  He suggested we go for lunch, I politely told him we had already eaten. We sat in the foyer of the hotel and proceeded to check email etc. Twenty minutes later we were escorted to our room. Not losing face worked, our room was quickly cleaned and made ready for us. It is a nice room with a large bathroom and a balcony (if you want to climb out of the window to access it). I quickly washed out our cycle gear and after showering and checking our route for the next few days we headed out for a wander around the Town.

We are not technically in Mui Ne. Mui Ne is actually a very tiny part of this area. This area spreads out over a 10 kilometre area of beach and shoreline. The area has a lot of kite boarding schools and is a very popular area for kite boarding. We chatted to one of the instructors and he told us that it is quite hard to learn, but \”this area is a very good area to learn, as the water and wind help you learn quickly\”. Not sure how to interpret that. \”Once you learn here you can kiteboard anywhere in the world\”. Before you are allowed to go out with a kite and board, they teach you about the wind, the current of the sea and then they let you go. He told us you don’t need a lot of arm strength as the kite is attached to your body by a harness. Not for me, I would be afraid that the kite would just take me away and you would never see me again. I will stick to cycling.

It was nice to sit there for a while with a beer and watch the kite boarders, a very relaxing afternoon.

This area, like Nha Trang, is a little more expensive than other areas we have cycled through, but it is a beach touristy area.

We have heard that the Vua Tang ferry is not running, but have decided to head down the coast anyway. If it is running all well and good, if it is not then we have added 50 kms to our journey, which is not a big deal as we are ahead of schedule. We will be entering Ho Chi Minh from the south and not along the A1 from the east.