Author: ninemilesperhour

28th FEBRUARY 2019

When I wake I feel much better than last night, with my headache gone and an easy cycle to look forward to. I’ve been told that my hotel doesn’t do breakfasts, but the lady owner says she’s willing to cook me up an omelette if I’d like one. This sounds good to me so I take her up on the offer, only to be left feeling slightly puzzled when a baguette and two fried eggs arrive. Oh Well. Before leaving I head into the village to buy two large bottles of water for the road. I open one immediately and it tastes bloody awful, like it’s gone stale after sitting in a glass for days. However, the seal on the first bottle is definitely unbroken and so is the cap on the second one. I think the fact that they’ve been sitting outside in direct sunlight may account for their stagnant taste.

There’s one big hill I need to climb to take me away from sea-level at Vinh Hy, although thankfully it’s nowhere near as steep as the roads I took into town yesterday. The slope is still a challenge, with one guy even struggling to get up the hill on his old motorbike, eventually coming to a halt about halfway up. I just plod slowly to the top, before a small downhill takes me through an arid looking landscape with spiky cacti at the roadside. It appears this peninsula I’m cycling on, jutting out from the rest of the country, must have it’s own dry micro-climate. The surrounding area looks almost Mediterranean, and as I continue descending I find myself cycling through a small section of vineyards. I somehow never thought of Vietnam as a wine producer.

This side of the hills is slightly more populated too, and I stop for lunch when I see a large metal garage with a Banh Mi stall outside. I must look a frazzled, sweaty mess when I stop as the lady owner invites me to come inside, plugs in a pedestal fan and points it straight at me. Her husband, incongrously wearing an Australian beach cricket top, then ambles over with a jug of iced tea for me. The poor bloke looks like he’s just woken up, but he wanders off again and returns with four small bananas on a plate. He simply hands them to me and says ‘Free.’ What a brilliant family ! I can’t thank them enough as it’s an absolute godsend to be getting out of the heat and downing a huge cold drink today.

Getting back onto the road, I’m soon out of the dry, cactus-ridden terrain and back down to sea-level. Now I’m cycling through an area of salt mining fields, essentially large pools of sea water that dry in the blazing sun to leave only the salt. I’m still benefitting from a strong tailwind this morning, and flying along so quickly that I’m going to be early for a 1.00pm check in. To kill time I just stop under a beachside palm tree, look out to sea and finish my remaining bananas. I can see my destination of Phan Rang across a small bay, and before long I’m making my way into town over a long bridge with a gentle slope at either side.

At my accommodation the owner says the person in my room hasn’t checked out yet and asks if I would mind a four bed dorm to myself. Hey, why not ? I have a shower, bang my head on the low door frame on the way out and get bitten by a mosquito. As per normal, my first hour involves an afternoon siesta. I’ve found myself tremendously tired in the last couple of days, which I’m hoping is just due to the heat. When I do wake I manage to squish the mossie that had been annoying and biting me earlier. There’s now a black and red stain on the wall, which is half mosquito and half my sucked blood.

I’m one street behind the beach, so wander down around tea time to find a rather clean stretch of sand by Vietnamese standards. The sun is setting over trees at the South end of the beach, and I sit there watching locals jogging, fishing and kicking footballs. On the way back I stop at a Plastic Chair Cafe across from my hotel. Communication problems abound, but I think I manage to order a rice meal at the very least. Although, what it’s going to be accompanied by is anybody’s guess. In Vietnamese, Fish is ‘Ca’ and Chicken is ‘Ga’, so with my pronunciation skills I could end up with either. Or something else altogether.

When my food arrives I’m not exactly sure what it is. It looks like it might be a tiny bird or a fish with most of its head removed, apart from the eyes, creepily. I think it’s a fish. I pull a piece of flesh off and it’s definitely a fish. To my slight relief, it turns out to be a bit like a sardine and tastes pretty good. Through a convoluted series of mimes I think I’ve just about managed to arrange breakfast for tomorrow morning as well.

The next day doesn’t start well. I go for a morning poo and, much to my surprise, it comes out more liquid than solid. I’m really hoping that isn’t a result of yesterday’s off-tasting water. On a brighter note, I do indeed get breakfast at last night’s Plastic Chair Cafe. It’s not gourmet, basically just fried eggs and sliced cucumber in a couple of baguettes, but it does the job. When I leave I take a bottle of water from the shelf, but the owners make sure they swap it with one from the fridge, which is always a nice touch.

Today I have the choice of a straight 64km down the QL1A or a longer 77km round a quiet coastal route. I choose the latter, even if that extra 13km means being out in the heat for longer. I’m not going to experience anything different on the big main road, just the usual noisy traffic and a greater chance of punctures. Heading South out of town I pass a succession of smelly fish sauce factories, before climbing up into a dry, desert landscape strewn with hundreds of large round boulders. Some of these rocks are the size of cars and are perched at precarious, almost impossible angles. The road continually twists in towards the interior, then back out towards the coast, but never gets too hilly to be strenuous. The biggest bonus for me today is that there’s cloud cover for most of my trek round this coastal route. It would have been a hot, tough ride in direct sunlight.

The coast road ends with a downhill that takes me onto flat land and past more brilliantly white salt pools. This straight road and a change of direction slows me right down, putting me into a headwind for the last few kilometres before the town of Ca Na. I stop a couple of times on this section as I’m starting to feel a little woozy, a sensation that’s no doubt related to my runny poo this morning. When I do reach the junction with the QL1A there’s a big roadsign saying left to Ho Chi Minh City and right to Hanoi. According to this sign there’s over 1,400km between here and Hanoi. I’ve come a long way.

Once I’m back on the big road, I stop almost immediately at a Plastic Chair Cafe as I feel a pressing need to eat and rest. The menu in this place is written in both Vietnamese and English, which means I can go crazy and order without fear for once. It turns out they don’t have my first two choices and suggest that I order ‘Grilled Squid in Sour’, which is probably the same meal I would have received if I’d just ordered blindly. The owners two daughters are about ten years old and go out of their way to be helpful. They show me to my seat, keep topping up my jug of iced tea and, of course, keep asking me questions to practice their English. When my meal arrives it is delicious, although something has obviously been lost in translation between ‘Sour’ and ‘Spicy.’ I’ve also found that any dish described as ‘Squid’ will be sure to have a couple of baby octopus hiding in there as well.

Feeling much better after a sit down and some food, I speed along the QL1A to Tuy Phong. I turn off the main road, then follow a stony track and go through a bustling market before finding my accommodation for tonight. I’ve arrived just before my 2.00pm check in, having covered today’s 77km in a respectable time with the aid of a helpful tailwind. I pop out for a simple dinner of Banh Mi in what I discover is quite a dusty, non-descript town. My plan was to possibly spend a Rest Day here tomorrow, but I think I’ll move on to somewhere more pleasant. At night I apply online for my Cambodian e-visa, which I’m hoping gets granted in the next ten days before my Vietnamese visa runs out.

 

27th FEBRUARY 2019

There’s two things that are sometimes difficult to find in Vietnamese accommodation – soft beds and hot showers. Quite often I’ll get in from a days cycling and sit down heavily on the bed, my arse looking forward to a comfortable landing, only to be surprised by a surface that feels like brick. In a similar vein, it’s quite common here for showers to be lukewarm at best, or even a touch cold. However, the Lily Hotel in Cam Ranh surpassed all my expectations yesterday with a remarkably hot, steaming shower. In fact, it was such a novelty that I have an extra shower for the road before leaving this morning. It’s an utterly pointless exercise though, as I’ll be a hot, sweaty mess within a few kilometres.

Cycling back into town, I stop at a Plastic Chair Cafe that has a large ‘Mi Quang’ sign outside. I’m not entirely sure you’re supposed to have Mi Quang for breakfast, but the young chap inside cooks one up for me nonetheless. It’s a filling noodle bowl with beef, prawns and quail’s egg, served with a brittle, thin poppadum and a side salad. One of my favourite things about Vietnam is that you can enjoy a huge, tasty, freshly-cooked breakfast for just under a pound. This meal will keep me going all the way to Vinh Hy today.

During my first hour this morning I follow the QL1A road and enjoy being blown along effortlessly by a steady tailwind. From the main road I turn left for my final 30km and make my way towards a hilly, coastal National Park. Just as I turn onto this quieter route I find that one lane has been completely taken up by rice drying upon the road. For two hundred metres there is a carpet of rice grains spread across one lane, gaining heat from both the hot tar and the blazing sun. Every vehicle that passes has to use the opposite side of the road to avoid driving over the rice. At either end of this rice mat there’s an old lady sitting on a chair in the shade, presumably ready to spring into action should a car or scooter attempt to run over their produce. I’m not sure about the hygiene implications of drying rice on a public road, but I do notice leaves, twigs and gravel in amongst the long sea of grains.

I’ve turned North for the first few kilometres on this new road, almost doubling back on myself in the process. It’s only with this change of direction that I can appreciate the tailwind that I’ve been enjoying for the last couple of days. It’s also a nasty reminder, albeit only a brief one, of the headwinds that plagued me for most of my journey South. The road then arcs round the top end of a peninsula and begins to meander towards some forested hills. The first slope looks horrific from the bottom, a mostly unshaded ribbon of grey concrete stretching up into the distance. The summit looks to be about 2km away, so I figure I might make it in three bursts with rest stops on the way up. I get into slow, plodding mode and just keep crawling along, eventually coming to a halt under a tree about ninety percent of the way up. I’m quite impressed with that effort ! I take a picture looking back down the slope I’ve just climbed, but these type of photos never do the steepness any justice.

Then I more or less follow the coast, on a hilly, twisting, turning road. At times I’m shot right back down to sea-level, and at others I’m climbing to around fifty metres above. It’s about mid-day now, it’s bloody hot and there’s barely a cloud in the sky. To my left the sea is the most ridiculous colour of tropical, aquamarine blue. Sitting a few hundred metres offshore is Binh Hung island, which provides shelter from the open sea and has allowed floating restaurants and Homestays to be built in the calm waters between the island and shore. This is cycle trip heaven.

I face climbing one final big hill which will take me up and over to the small fishing village of Vinh Hy. It’s twice the height of today’s first hill, but thankfully the gradient is a lot more steady. The climb is slow and exposed though, with less and less tree cover the higher I ride. My main problem now is the heat, as I’m trudging along so slowly that I’m not creating any breeze for myself. A couple of long hairpin bends through dry, scrubby bush get me close to the top and afford spectacular views of the coastal road I’ve just cycled. By this point I’m stopping at any opportunity for shade and gulping down water like there’s no tomorrow. At the top I have 3km of speedy downhill that take me into Vinh Hy, although I manage to miss the turn off for my accommodation as it’s no more than a dirt path. I’ve almost cycled past the village before I realise what’s happened.

My hotel is a white, two storey building that looks oddly out of place on the outskirts of a messy fishing village. Stepping into a large, fenced courtyard, the hotel is on my right and the owner’s Mediterranean-styled house is on the left. There are plenty of tall palms and shady trees in the brick courtyard, and the owners seem to spend a lot of their time lazing in hammocks that are strung between them. The owner lady has perfect English from seventeen years of living in Seattle, and has now returned with her husband to live in the same village she was born in.

For the second hotel in a row my shower is beautifully hot, but I start to feel really dehydrated when I step out. The hills and heat and relentless sunshine have taken it out of me today. I’m so thirsty that I even succumb to the mini bar, which is almost unheard of for me. I chuck down a can of 7-Up, which costs the same as a can of beer, then promptly crash out for a two hour siesta.

On waking I take a stroll into the village for a look around and to get my hands on a much-needed bottle of water. My God I’m so thirsty ! The village itself is situated on a small, circular bay and flanked all round by hills and cliffs. It’s the perfect natural harbour. There’s no beach, just a kind of half-built pier that runs right round the seafront. Squid are drying on large racks that rest on the sea wall and the harbour is choc-a-bloc with small wooden fishing boats. There are plenty of coracles too, looking like round floating tubs, that are used to ferry people from the shore to their boat in the same way that we would use a dinghy. It seems like the whole village is somehow involved in fishing or tourism, even though it’s slightly off the beaten track. The streets are claustrophobically narrow, with only the main routes wide enough to take a car or truck. The side streets are so thin that they’re only fit for bikes or scooters.

I check out the village food options before I head back, but there doesn’t seem to be much happening. There’s a couple of street stalls selling some kind of unidentifiable snacks and also a seafood place, but I tend to avoid them with the language barrier and a potentially pricey meal. In the end I stumble upon a woman who looks like she’s making pancakes at a little stall on the seafront. Through miming I ask if I can eat and she responds by picking up a cockle with some chopsticks and waving it at me to show what she’s making. The cockle drops to the ground and we all laugh which is a good ice-breaker. I raise two fingers to indicate that I’ll have a couple of whatever she’s making and take a seat at a table beside some locals. They all seem friendly and a little fascinated that I’m eating with them. For me, it’s good to watch how you’re supposed to eat these things before I have to attempt one myself. I get a salad and a little bowl of runny orange dipping sauce. The meal itself is a closed pancake containing octopus, squid and bean sprouts (I think she omitted the cockles after dropping the first one in front of me.) It strikes me as a bit of a weird mix, but it all seems to work somehow. I dip my salad and seafood pancakes in the orange sauce and chomp away happily, ordering another two when I finish just to fill me up completely. The whole meal comes to 20,000 VND, which works out at 15p per pancake. What a top find !

Full up and walking back, I pass the village’s recycling depot. They are busy crushing cans. The method they are using is to pile them all in their driveway and to drive back and forwards over them with a small truck. One bloke is at hand with a broom, standing at the side and sweeping the cans into the truck’s path before it drives over them, then reverses. Absolute Genius.

When I arrive back I’m straight into the mini-bar again for some orange juice. I must have caught too much sun today as I’m still feeling dehydrated and have a banging headache. I end up clearing out the mini-bar, minus the beers, and am in my bed by 10.00pm. I feel absolutely exhausted, and wouldn’t be too surprised if I’ve got a touch of heat stroke. Lucky I’ve pencilled in an extremely easy day for tomorrow then.

 

 

 

24th FEBRUARY 2019

My eyes are open at 5.30am, which is slightly surprising considering I was still awake and half-pissed about four hours ago. If I got out of bed now and walked to the beach I could get there in plenty of time for sunrise over the South China Sea. Or more likely I could lie there semi-comatose, staring into space, while a warm, pink glow slowly creeps into my room from what must have been a glorious sunrise.

Breakfast is a no frills affair and served downstairs by the one remaining staff member that Trung hasn’t fired yet. It’s a rather odd collection of foodstuffs, containing some kind of breakfast biscuit, coffee, a guava and two fried eggs which I squeeze into a baguette. Trung is up and about too, not looking any the worse for last night’s rum consumption. Back upstairs, I go about fixing the puncture on inner tube number two. I couldn’t locate the tiny hole at the roadside yesterday, so I fill my wash hand basin up with water and slowly turn the fully-inflated tube around until a stream of small bubbles rises to the surface. ‘Aha ! Found you !’ I say out loud, before taking my time patching the tube so I make a good job of it.

I’ve only a short 50km cycle to Nha Trang today, so barring tyre issues it should be fairly straightforward. I say Goodbye to Trung, who’s been an absolute star, and trundle gently through the town to a Banh Mi stall, even though I’ve not long had breakfast. The woman who owns the place seems to take a shine to me, cramming way too many ingredients into my two sausage Banh Mi. She tells me by writing on a piece of paper that she’s forty-nine and seems very pleased when I write that I’m forty-seven. When I say Goodbye she gives me two oranges for the road and squeezes my hand meaningfully as I depart.

I’m back on the main QL1A route today, whose roadsides are the usual litter-strewn minefield for my tyres. Heading inland for an hour, I pass through the big town of Ninh Hoa, then swing back towards the coast again and into a headwind for the next hour or so. By early afternoon I’ve moved to riding Southwards, just around the time when the headwind is normally at it’s strongest. Amazingly though, for my final 15km the headwind seems to disappear and there’s a slight chance I may even have a tailwind ! At this point in my journey I’ve nearly reached the South-East corner of Vietnam, which should mark a change in wind direction for me. The Brazilian couple I met three days ago had complained about fighting headwinds all the way along the South Coast, whereas I should have them behind me as I’ll be riding in the opposite direction to them.

About half an hour from my destination the road splits and I spend a while climbing steadily, before a fast downhill takes me down towards the coast and Nha Trang. It’s a large, modern city with half a million inhabitants, hugging the coast and surrounded by a series of jagged mountains. I ride along a seafront of restaurants and high rise hotels for a couple of kilometres and then turn inland to find my guest house about five minutes walk from the beach. My bike ends up in a tiny outside courtyard, chained to one of the owner’s scooters, as there’s nothing else to secure it to. I’m still a bit dazed after last night’s rum drinking malarkey, so my first hour in Nha Trang is spent crashed out upstairs.

Heading out for food later, I’m taken aback by the amount of Russians in the city. They are everywhere ! My fried noodles with seafood is eaten at a restaurant where the menu is printed in Vietnamese, English and Russian. As I take a scenic route back to my guest house, I notice Bar Moscow and Bar Yerevan, complete with pockets of huge, blond Russians standing outside. In much the same way as chavvy Brits would head straight for a Lineker’s Bar in Spain, the Russians all seem to stick together like a herd here too. Trung, being the Russian expert, told me that most Russians can’t afford to go on holidays in Europe so opt for cheap, hot destinations in South-East Asia instead. The result is that Nha Trang seems over-run with tourists, both Russian and Chinese.

The following day I remain in Nha Trang, primarily to get my hands on some spare inner tubes, but also because I wake up feeling dog tired. I’m not sure if this is a delayed hangover or my body just telling me to relax and recuperate after a few hot days in the saddle. My guest house had recommended a bike shop, so I walk there via a Plastic Chair Cafe only to find out that it’s actually a motorbike shop. Nevertheless, they do provide me with a couple of spare Kenda inner tubes after I show them what I’m after on Google translate. I don’t have a lot of choice as it’s the only inner tubes they have for my size of wheel. The ridiculously cheap price doesn’t make me feel any more optimistic about their quality and prospects either.

By mid-afternoon I decide it’s about time I get to the beach and have a proper swim in the sea. I spend about twenty minutes in the water and it feels brilliant. Why the Hell haven’t I made the effort to do this before now ? When I get out I find I’m lying on a beach that is choc-full of red Russians who don’t appear to favour wearing sunscreen. By 5.00pm the sun is starting to dip between the high rise hotels behind the beach, casting long shadows over the sand. Most of the Russians are now standing up so that the low sun is still able to shine on their entire bodies. Presumably, if they remained lying down then the sun would be hitting them at too shallow an angle and, consequently, they wouldn’t get so tanned.

The next morning I say Goodbye to the lovely family at the Thinh Le Guest House. My bike is still faithfully attached to one of the family scooters, the lock being looped through both our back wheels. I pump up my tyres for good luck, roll down the main street along the seafront and stop for Banh Mi and iced coffee before leaving town. Then I follow a road South that will take me out of the touristy Nha Trang, inland over a river and then back out towards the coast. For the first few kilometres there’s a nice big concrete divider on this road which keeps bikes and scooters separate from trucks and buses. This divider ends eventually, but the road is still far quieter than the nasty old QL1A route.

I’m passing plush hotels and golf courses further South of Nha Trang, for tourists who want to avoid the chavvy Russian crowds in the city. Because these resorts are so upmarket, the road quality around them is excellent and I’m enjoying a smooth, easy cycle for the first time in ages. And what’s that ? That’s not a tailwind is it ? I think it might just be ! It seems that I’m now turning the corner, both physically and metaphorically, as I round the South-Eastern tip of the country. The road then skirts round a bulky set of hills, hugging a rocky seaside cliff for 10km of stunning cycling. The coastal scenery is definitely becoming more spectacular, and the sea a more tropical blue the further South I ride. Once I’m round the hills and back onto flat ground the cycling becomes incredibly easy. The road reverts back to smooth, quiet dual carriageway again, with a landscape of beach resorts and hotel construction off to my left. This strong tailwind is now blowing me along beautifully. What a difference it makes to be speeding along in a high gear with next to no effort. I bloody deserve it too, after slogging South into a headwind for almost a month !

I cross a river just past the Cam Ramh International Airport, which must only exist to serve Nha Trang, and move inland once more. I’m back on the QL1A road for the last half hour, still busy as ever and still full of potentially puncture-causing debris at it’s edges. My accommodation is just off the main road, and staffed by a middle aged woman who is more efficient than friendly. She assures me it will be safe to leave my bike unlocked in the reception area, but I chain it to the stair bannister just to be sure.

By mid afternoon I’m showered and off for a wander through town, stumbling upon a Buddhist temple that is interesting, if a little surreal. The whole place looks more like a fairy tale garden with multiple and ramdom statues of unicorns, elephants, serpents, dragons and Buddhas. There’s also a massive reclining Buddha, about fifteen metres long, draped in a gold robe and with a wagon wheel design on the sole of each huge, chunky bare foot. I spend a good while just exploring the grounds, before stopping for some bang average Banh Mi on the way back. I book my accommodation for the next three nights, making sure that my longest day of cycling is no more than 70km. I’ve now got two weeks left on my Vietnamese visa and about 450km left till I reach the border.

 

 

 

23rd FEBRUARY 2019

I wake up to a message from Bobby, the owner of the Ocean Beach Hostel where I stayed two nights ago. He’s asking me if I have any contact numbers for the Brazilian couple as they had apparently slipped away yesterday without paying for their accommodation. Naughty ! It’s 9.00am when I leave Tuy Hoa, pausing almost immediately at a Banh Mi stall for breakfast and a seat. On the road out of town I find that the headwind has started early, and it’s destined to remain in my face for the vast majority of my 90km day. I’m riding parallel to the coast, but about 5km inland for the first quarter of my cycle and back onto the busy QL1A road again. There’s no shelter from the wind through a flat landscape of rice fields, and I make very slow progress to begin with.

About 20km into my ride I’m through the rice fields and heading towards a barrier of steep sided hills. The road splits into two here, similar to the Hai Van Pass, with a tunnel through the hills or a slow, meandering route over them. Again, I have no choice with which option to take as scooters and cyclists are forbidden from using the tunnel. I take the smaller road and start heading East, back towards the sea. The climb isn’t too bad, gradual at first with a couple of hairpin bends. I’m actually thankful for all the twists and turns as they give me some momentary relief from the persistent headwind. About halfway up I feel as if the bike is wobbling, and for a few weird seconds I think that this section of road may just be bumpy. It takes me another few seconds to realise that, of course it’s not a bumpy road, it’s another bloody flat tyre. I stop under the shade of a roadside bush, sit on the ground and put on my final spare inner tube. I’m not sure whether I’m being really unlucky with punctures, or that my tyres are becoming more worn down and susceptible after 1,200km. In a way I’m amazed I haven’t had more flat tyres, given the amount of junk and debris lying along Vietnamese roadsides.

With my tyre inflated, I slog up what’s left of the hill, over the summit and enjoy a view of the ocean once again. I’m a little nervous about the tyre re-puncturing so take it easy on the way down, pausing for a drink in the shade when the road levels out again. When I restart, a young guy in a cafe has obviously been watching me taking on liquids in the heat. He walks out into the road with his hands up, beckons me to stop and then hands me a can of cherry coke. I shake his hand to show how grateful I am for this act of kindness. It’s only a small gesture, but it is well and truly appreciated. Five minutes further down the road his group passes me again on a pair of motorcycles and all four of them wave or say Hello. What a good bunch of kids.

Another hour or so down the coast I see what I think is a sprig of dried grass sticking to my tyre and whirling round with each rotation. When I stop to investigate it turns out to be a skinny length of metal, like an elongated staple, sticking into the tyre. I pull it out and immediately think that I shouldn’t have, thinking it would be a similar scenario to pulling a knife out of a stab victim. In much the same way as a lodged knife could stem any blood from a wound, my length of metal may have been plugging the puncture. Sure enough, within two minutes of removing the metal, the air has escaped and I’m left with yet another flat tyre. Im not even annoyed or surprised any more. Pulling over into the driveway of a closed business, I set about patching up my inner tube from this morning as I know where the puncture is. However, I can’t locate a hole on the tube I’ve just removed, so I’m hoping that’s my last tyre drama for today. There’s even an upside to getting all these flats – the tyre that was so difficult to fit two days ago is now a lot more pliable and easy to put on.

By mid-afternoon the headwind is still blowing against me and it’s starting to get uncomfortably hot. I stop for water and, instead of getting it from the fridge, the shop owner goes out the back of her shop to bring me a bottle from the freezer. She didn’t need to make the extra effort and get me frozen water, but I’m extremely glad that she did. So that’s two flat tyres and two random acts of kindness I’ve received today.

When I finally turn off the main road, I cycle my final 5km to Doc Let past a host of what look like prawn farms. I get to the Light Hotel, which has some kind of major groundworks going on at it’s entrance, and meet Trung the owner. He’s about forty with a Beatles haircut and is tiny, even by Vietnamese standards. Most of his hotel reviews had said what a good bloke he is, and he lives up to that by giving me a Bia Saigon (Saigon Beer) as soon as I get in the door. His English is sketchy, but he’s fluent in Russian, having lived and studied there for seventeen years. When he Google translates, he types in Russian rather than Vietnamese because he says that works better with English. We talk for a bit in faltering English and also by passing his tablet between us and typing into Google translate. We get talking about alcohol, and before long he’s pouring me a shot of Vietnamese dark rum to go with my beer.

I go upstairs to my room, but only change out of my trio of padded shorts as I want to see the town’s beach before dark. It’s about a ten minute walk and I arrive to find a wide, clean beach backed by hotels and palm trees. The expanse of sand must be 5km long and both ends of the beach are overlooked by tall, jungle covered hills. It’s such a gorgeous, peaceful spot and just what I needed to unwind after a day of headwinds, heat and punctures. Darkness is beginning to fall and the remaining light from the West is throwing the line of palm trees behind the beach into silhouettes. It feels like I’ve now reached the Promised Land after the day I’ve had. I ask a Vietnamese beachgoer if he’ll take my picture, before another random guy wants to be in the picture too. Then the photographer decides he wants to be snapped with the Westerner as well, so now there’s three of us in the shot. It always cracks me up when locals want their picture taken with me, although I do find it quite an endearing habit.

Trung had told me that eating at the beach would be expensive and the cheaper options were further inland. I’m walking back towards the village and see Trung outside his hotel as I approach. When I ask him to recommend somewhere to eat, he replies ‘You go for food now ? I can take you !’ We jump on his motorbike and head to a place on the outskirts of the village that I cycled past on the way in. They obviously know him well at the restaurant as he must bring a lot of his guests here. We sit outside with his tablet to translate for us, a bottle of dark rum and a large bottle of coke for a mixer. Trung orders rabbitfish for himself and recomnends that I have Bo Ap Chao, which looks a bit like beef casserole with rice. It’s one of those meals you cook yourself, adding beef to a sauce with vegetables that are heated on a silver tray above a gas burner. The sauce is absolutely delicious, although I’m told it’s a secret recipe that the restaurant will never divulge. It’s one of my favourite dishes of the trip so far.

After the meal we stay and chat for a while, with Google translating things between us, before heading back to sit outside the hotel. Trung asks if I’m going to sleep or if I would like another rum. I tell him I’ll have one more. One then becomes two, and a couple of hours later the bottle is three quarters empty. I stop there as I’m a little pissed now and really need to get some sleep. I’ve got a tyre to patch up before leaving tomorrow and I would like to see one sunrise over the sea before I leave the East coast of Vietnam. Trung has gone above and beyond today, and I’ve seen first hand how his hospitality gets him such great reviews. I’ll certainly be adding my comments to that ever expanding list of praise. Today has been testing in many ways, although getting to the stunning Doc Let Beach has more than made up for all the little hassles. Now, barring tyre dramas and hangovers, it should be a fairly easy 50km run to Nha Trang tomorrow.

 

 

 

 

 

22nd FEBRUARY 2019

As I’m staying right on the beach, I thought I’d make the effort today and get up early to watch sunrise over the sea. From previous days I figure the sun will rise around 6.30am, so I’m up and ready at 6.15am, only to find that I’ve missed sunrise by ten minutes. Bollocks. The Brazilians are already up and cooking themselves breakfast, with Felippe showing me a time-lapse video of the sunrise I’ve just missed. I’m quietly relieved to find it wasn’t all that spectacular. Instead of going back to bed I just lie in a hammock for a while, staring out to sea with tired, glazed eyes. I go back into the dorm and bring all my gear outside to a table so I don’t wake anyone while packing, although there’s now only four bodies left in the twelve person dorm. The Brazilians leave before me, planning on riding to Quy Nhon today and then getting a bus from there to Hoi An. The big old cheats !

Now that I know how to operate a Presta valve, my spare inner tube goes into my front tyre, and I’m ready to leave by 8.00am. I cycle away from the beachside hostel and notice immediately that the inner tube is bulging out from under my front tyre rim. Bloody Hell ! My first thought is just to deflate the tube slightly so the bulge pops back into the tyre from whence it came. This doesn’t work, so I find a shady spot across from some village shops and get the front wheel off again. Once I remove the tyre, I see my problem is that parts of the tyre rim are starting to separate and peel off. There’s actually not enough rim left in some places to hold back the fully inflated inner tube. That doesn’t stop me trying though. It takes me a couple of attempts, but I manage to coax the inner tube to remain inside the tyre. A local lad in his twenties has been watching and helps me put the wheel back on and re-attach all my gear.

Trundling off along the bumpy track through the village, my eyes are glued to the rotations of my front wheel. Within a few seconds the inner tube bulges out from the tyre rim again. Fuck, Fuck, Fuck ! I carry on through the village until I find a quiet, shaded spot next to a barn to give me some peace to try and sort this. It doesn’t take me long to realise I’m not going to get very far with this tyre and it’s worn rim. The inner tube is just going to keep popping out. Infuriatingly, this is the brand new Schwalbe tyre I bought in Hanoi that now has a damaged rim as well as being worn smooth.

Luckily, very luckily, I’ve kept the old tyre and have been transporting it, tied on top of my panniers, all the way from Hanoi. It’s been folded into an awkward shape for a month, causing ‘edges’ to form along the fold lines rather than looking like a full, smooth circle. However, this pointy rubber loop is currently my best bet. I get all my gear off the bike again and attempt to fit this now mis-shapen tyre back onto the wheel. It takes a while getting the tyre to fit, but gradually it starts to fall roughly into place. I semi-inflate the tube and sort of massage the tyre back onto the wheel rim. It’s far from ideal and worryingly lumpy in some places, yet it still looks like it could do the job. Heading off again on the stony, single track road I’m super conscious about riding as gently as I can. When I reach the smoother main road I find that the wheel ‘bumps’ slightly every time the mis-shapen part spins round onto the ground.

I’ve not yet eaten breakfast so I stop at the first roadside Plastic Chair Cafe that I see. There’s already a guy sitting at a table and eating a bowl of something that might be noodles or rice. I just point to the bloke’s dish and give the owner lady a Thumbs Up to say I’d like one of those too. The owner brings me a can of coke because I’m a Westerner and I hear the sounds of frying coming from the kitchen. When my bowl arrives, the contents are a warm orange colour and look like a thick rice porridge garnished with spring onions. After a few mouthfuls I discover that my dish also contains an unexpected bonus in the shape of cockles, squid bits and a couple of large prawns.  I’ve had a real result on the Food Lucky Dip this morning.

I carry on cautiously, still concerned about my front tyre situation. It does seem to be holding together well enough though, despite the odd bumping noise that comes with each wheel rotation. I remain on the busy QL1A road today, choosing directness over quiet detours in the hope I’ll make it to Nha Trang in three days time for spares. At one point I climb a steep hill and catch glimpses of the bay below through a large, outdoor cafe. Pausing to take in this spectacular view is just the excuse I need to stop for another iced coffee. I swear I’m becoming addicted. The cafe is a very chilled spot, with hammocks hanging from tree branches and between the support columns of a palm leaf roof. Taking a seat, I slowly sip my iced coffee and take in the scene before me. I’m above lush jungle, which stretches for a mile below me towards seaside houses and fishing villages on the huge Xuan Dai Bay. The bay itself is almost turquoise in colour, while the dark green hills at the opposite shore have pockets of white sand dunes running down them. Peppering the blue waters are flotillas of small, wooden fishing boats. I stay for a while, marvelling at the view and taking a multitude of pictures.

My rice porridge breakfast filled me up so well that it keeps me going right through lunchtime and onwards to my destination of Tuy Hoa (T-Wha). Despite my tyre issues, I’m there about mid-afternoon and check in to a Homestay on a quiet residential street, facing onto rice fields. Three generations of the host family manage to cram themselves in downstairs, while the first floor is given over to guest rooms. There’s not much interaction at this Homestay though, they just show me my room and leave me to my own devices. Just before sunset I go for a walk along a raised track between acres of rice fields opposite the house. The sun is caught between low cloud and distant hills as it sinks, casting an orangey-pink glow over the bright green of the rice plants. The whole scene is unusually still and peaceful for Vietnam, the only sound being a croaky frog chorus from the waterlogged fields.

For dinner I stop at a large Plastic Chair Cafe on my way into town, a premises that takes up one whole corner of a street block. Language barriers abound so I just stand with a couple of the staff and point blindly at the menu. An old guy who speaks a bit of English gets up from his table to help, asks if I like beef and orders food on my behalf. I’m brought my customary glass of Westerner’s coke, before a plate arrives containing nothing more than a large circle of cold beef. There’s a centimetre of fat round the outer edge of the beef, similar to a dish I tried at Lunar New Year and apparently a Vietnamese delicacy. Along with the beef I get a plate of salad, a crispy poppadum thing and a couple of dipping sauces. One is the familiar fish sauce, while the other is brown, spicy and full of floating chilli slices. I dip the beef in the fish sauce and the poppadum in the spicy sauce, then try it the other way round just to experiment.

Just as I finish, they bring me out a second beef dish. Jesus, the old fellow has only gone and ordered me two meals ! Was the first one only a starter ? This latest offering is chunks of surprisingly tender beef in a spicy sauce with courgettes. I’m pretty sure it would be delicious, but my taste buds have now been rendered useless by the overpowering spiciness. All the staff have been watching me at various points, seemingly fascinated to see how I cope with their food. The waiter kid feels the need to bring me over a knife and fork during this second meal, a disappointing testimony to my clumsy chopstick use. And I honestly thought I was improving.

The whole meal comes to 200,000 VND (about £8.50), which is a lot more than my usual outlay, and gives me the uneasy feeling that I might have been ripped off. Then I reason that I’ve just had two good big meals, one of which was a delicacy, and think that maybe that price would be about right. In any case, £8.50 would barely cover two pints in the UK, so I can’t complain too much. There’s no sign of life when I get back to the Homestay, so I just take myself upstairs. It’s been an odd day. From missed sunrises, to wonky tyres, to surprise meals and amazing views. Just another day in the life of a cycle trip.

20th FEBRUARY 2019

My day off in Quy Nhon is preceded by a much-needed twelve hour sleep, from 8.30pm last night until 8.30am this morning. I felt completely shattered after yesterday’s 100km trek into an all day headwind. The devilish combination of too much heat, too much sun and too big a distance just about had me beaten. I tell myself there will be no more 100km days on this trip.

Anyway, I need to purchase a few things today. Flip-flops are a must because I need to get my feet out in an attempt to even up my absurd tan lines. I’ve got a sock-level straight line right above my ankles which is brown above and deathly white below which, quite frankly, looks ridiculous. Shorts are on my list too, as the arse cheeks are worn through on the pair I use most. I make my way to a gloriously air-conditioned Vin-Mart and try to find sizes that will come close to fitting me. Because Vietnamese people are smaller in general, even the XXL sizes seem too small. The flip-flops are fine as my toes stick out the front, my two t-shirts are pretty tight and the shorts feel like castration devices. Oh Well.

Just after mid-day I take a walk to the beach to find it almost deserted; there are literally only two people on the huge expanse of yellowy sand. Vietnamese just don’t go to the beach during the hottest part of the day, whereas UK beaches would be rammed at this hour on a hot, sunny day. However, the locals will start to venture down about 4.00pm, and the beach will remain busy well into the evening. I’m just glad to see a litter-free beach for once. On the way back I brave my first Vietnamese haircut, giving all my instructions in charades and rudimentary sign language. A young bloke takes on the task, paying particular attention to clippering the back and sides. I’ve no idea what the top is going to look like as he combs all my hair backwards to cut it. The result is that my hair looks a bit long and a bit high on top afterwards, but it’s not disastrous. Maybe that’s the trend in Vietnam. He charges me less than £1, but I give him £3 as he’s put in a fair bit of time and effort.

An afternoon siesta helps my continued recovery from yesterday’s battles, before I head to a Plastic Chair Cafe for dinner. It’s a place that does rice meals, displaying about ten different meat and vegetable dishes in trays at the counter to accompany the rice. I just point to the three nicest looking options without being entirely sure of their contents. When the meal is delivered I find I’ve chosen egg, something that resembles beef and a weird, flat meat that might be pork. All the dishes are spicy and slightly curry-like, but I really haven’t a clue what I’m eating. They all go down well though, along with a side of clear, tasteless soup.

Back at the hotel I have an iced coffee in the bar downstairs and message a Brazilian couple from Instagram who have been cycling North as I’ve been cycling South. Our paths are due to cross tomorrow and we’re both heading for the same accommodation. It’s only 40km down the coast too, so it should be a nice easy day. What could possibly go wrong ?

The next morning I allow myself a leisurely 10.30am start as I don’t want to get to my next accommodation too early for a 2.00pm check-in. As it’s such a short distance today there’s nothing to be gained by an early start. My destination is the idyllic sounding Ocean Beach Hostel, where I’m looking forward to spending some time in the sea on my arrival. Downstairs my bike is still resting against the coffee shop back wall, so the owners were true to their word, or perhaps fortunate that nobody tried to steal it. To be fair though, Vietnam has shown itself to be an exceptionally safe country so far, so there’s much less chance of bike theft here than in most other countries.

I amble along the 5km beachside to begin with, towards the South end of Quy Nhon Bay and hills that sport a resort name in huge, Hollywood-style white letters overlooking the city. Then it’s a steep climb into those very same hills and off through some picturesque and undulating coastal landscapes. I’m on a quieter road today too, so spend a bit of time playing with my GoPro camera and trying to get some ‘ride past’ shots. It feels like I have all the time in the world compared to yesterday. About halfway I meet a twenty-something Canadian cyclist heading in the opposite direction. He doesn’t actually tell me that he’s Canadian, but he does say ‘aboot’ all the time so it’s a pretty safe assumption. He’s also ginger-haired and rides without sunglasses, so I’m not quite sure how he copes with the sun and heat. We have a brief chat, and I find out he’s only going to Quy Nhon himself, so I sign off with the famous last words of ‘We’ve both only got 20km to go then, so it should be easy !’

About 2km later my back tyre starts to feel a bit wobbly. It’s funny how a flat tyre never feels like a flat tyre to begin with. Rear tyre punctures are always more of a nuisance as all my gear has to come off the bike first before I can remove the back tyre. I wheel my bike to a shady spot under some trees and set about my task. There are two spare Presta valve inner tubes in my panniers, which I try, but my pump doesn’t seem to fit them. A patch up job it is then. Before I put the tyre back on I run my fingers round the inside wall in case there’s any lingering sharp objects that would immediately re-puncture the inner tube. In doing this I find the culprit still sticking through the tyre. I pull it out to find a small piece of metal, about the size of a staple, only twice as thick. Slightly annoyingly, my brand new Schwalbe tyre that I bought in Hanoi a month ago has been almost worn smooth already. With all the weight on the rear end of my bike, I thought it would be a sensible idea to put the good tyre at the back. I realise that my rear tyre always wears down more quickly than my front, but a brand new tyre shouldn’t look so worn after a month. Procrastination has got the better of me here as I had been meaning to rotate my tyres for a few days now.

With all my gear reattached to the bike I’m about ready to go again. I give the back tyre a final squeeze, only to find that it’s already deflated slightly. Bollocks. Once again I remove all my gear from the bike, upend it, take off the tyre and try to find which part of the inner tube that the air is escaping from. It turns out that air is still getting out from under the patch I’ve just stuck on. At this point I decide that I might as well just rotate the tyres, putting the good one on the back and the dodgy one on the front so it’s easier to remove. After a further six patches my inner tube looks like it has some kind of horrible growth on it, yet air is still escaping. This is no good. My fingers are covered in oil and my patching clearly isn’t doing the job. I decide just to cycle the remaining 20km, stopping to pump up the tyre each time it deflates.

A further 2km down the road and my tyre is flat again. I carry on like this for a few more stops, before I have the bright idea of trying to see if the twenty-six inch inner tubes I’d bought in error will somehow fit round my twenty-eight inch wheel. They don’t. No matter how stretchy and rubbery they are, they just won’t reach right round. So my crappy, patchy inner tube goes back on and I continue limping down the road until it deflates once again. My plan is to somehow flounder my way to the hostel tonight and see if the Brazilians (or anyone else) has a spare inner tube I can buy. I continue my routine of cycling a kilometre or so until my tyre goes flat, stopping, pumping it up and then repeating the whole process. At the turn off for the Ocean Beach Hostel I’m faced with a road that is no more than a bumpy, stony single track. Just what I don’t need with today’s tyre issues. It’s 4.00pm now and 5.00pm by the time I crawl up to the hostel. I was meant to be in the sea three hours ago.

The English sounding owner must realise from my demeanour that I’ve had a shitty day, so he simply points me in the direction of the dorm building and says I can unpack and shower before formally checking in. When I delve into one of my plastic bags for shower gel, I find the top has popped open and the thick blue liquid has leaked all over my bag. It’s just been one of those days. The shower is basically an outside bathroom with a shower head fixed to the ceiling almost above the toilet. It’s like a mosquito carnival in there, but I’ll put up with slumming it when the location is so stunning in every other sense. I’ve been deliberately trying to avoid staying in Backpacker hostels on this trip in favour of Homestays, because I’m not going to experience or learn anything new in a Backpackers. However, this cheap, spectacular beachside location has made me re-evaluate that thinking.

When I get back to the dorm the Brazilian cycling couple are in the room. Weirdly, I already recognise the bloke from his Instagram pictures. We make our introductions and I tell them about my rubbish day and all my tyre issues. He tells me that he has a pump that can inflate my spare inner tube through a Presta valve, so we go outside to retrieve it from his bike. I go to attach the pump and just start pumping. It doesn’t work. Then he drops the bombshell by saying ‘No, you have to unscrew the top bit first !’ Oh, For Fuck Sake ! Once you take the plastic cap off, there’s a tiny metal screw on top of the valve that has to be undone as well. My spare inner tubes would have been fine if only I’d known how to operate a Presta valve ! All that time spent faffing around with patches and re-inflating my tyre, when I could just have swapped inner tubes ! I should be livid, but I’m just glad there’s a solution to my problem. Strangely, for all the long cycle trips I’ve taken, I’ve never once used a Presta valve. Every single inner tube I’ve used in the past has come with a Schrader valve, the same universal type you get on cars and motorbikes. Now at least I know what to do with a Presta valve, so I can simply put on one of my spare inner tubes before leaving tomorrow.

I go for food with the Brazilians, Felippe and Martina, and find out about their trip. They began after their work contract finished in New Zealand and are trying to cycle all the way back to Brazil. So far they’ve ridden through New Zealand, Australia and most of South East Asia. They aim to continue through Central Asia, Europe and eventually back home to Brazil via the foot of South America. They do fly a lot between destinations and put their bikes on buses to skip boring or difficult sections. It’s not a continuous ride by any stretch of the imagination, they just cycle when they want to. Martina says she doesn’t like the busy roads and noisy traffic in Vietnam, and they both think Vietnamese people aren’t as friendly as those in Indonesia, Thailand and Cambodia. I find this a bit odd as I’ve found most Vietnamese to be friendly, although they do seem to have become slightly less hospitable the further South I’ve cycled. Felippe suggests this might be a throwback to the Vietnam War and the fact that Southern Vietnam were on the losing side. This was a theory I’d actually thought of myself, but figured it was too far-fetched to be valid.

We all have beef noodle soup and a good chat, before we are asked to move on so that another group can use our table. Back at the hostel’s bar I slowly sup on a beer, while the Brazilian couple share a coke. We’re about thirty metres from the sea in a large, open sided bar with a palm leaf roof. I can almost feel today’s trials and tribulations fading away with the beer and the location. The Brazilians go for an early night as they want to be up early to witness sunrise over the sea tomorrow morning. I go for a walk along the quiet beach in the dark, paddling in the warm sea and illuminated only by the moonlight. However, I’m in my bunk and asleep by 10.00pm, thankful to have put this day to bed.

18th FEBRUARY 2019

The ever smiling Ron gives me coffee and an Oreo biscuit before I leave Quang Ngai. And, of course, the now customary hug. He then fills all my water bottles, and happily poses for selfies and pictures of himself standing outside his guest house. I think he’s probably the most genuine, good-natured bloke that I’ve met on my trip so far. As I’m leaving his wife shows me all the brilliant reviews they’ve had from British travellers, with the strong inference that I should do the same. They will get a great review too, because they thoroughly deserve it.

To my good fortune there’s a Banh Mi stall on the pavement right outside the Guesthouse, so I order two with extra fried egg before heading off. I’m up and running about an hour earlier than normal this morning in an attempt to get more distance covered before the early afternoon headwind. However, my cunning plans are thwarted as the headwind decides to make an early appearance too. It looks like I’ll be riding into the wind for the full 80km today, but at least that will cool me down on an otherwise hot day. For the most part I’ll be following the QL1A road again. The road bypasses most towns, whereas I go straight through as they are usually more interesting, whilst also offering shade and food options.

I’ve been getting into the habit of not stopping for lunch until I’m well past the halfway point for the day, as I tend to feel a bit lazy and sluggish after a big feed. I’d rather feel lethargic towards the end of the day than halfway through it. For today’s lunch I walk into a deserted Plastic Chair Cafe to find the owner asleep on a hammock near the back. I don’t want to wake the poor chap up so I try to creep back out, only for him to hear me, wake up and start cooking. He sleepily rustles up a noodle dish with some kind of fatty meat in it and charges me 65p for his efforts. He probably wishes that he’d stayed asleep. My stomach certainly wishes he had.

The road skirts round some hills and towards the coast, the change of direction pointing me straight into a fresh sea breeze. Despite this, I’m feeling really strong today. It always baffles me how I can feel great on some cycling days, and yet struggle on others with more or less the same routine. At Tam Quan I ride parallel to the beach and find my hotel up a dusty side street. I chain my bike to a thick roof support column outside reception and am told not to worry about it as the front gate gets closed every night.

The hotel is very close to being beachside, which would be lovely if the beach wasn’t strewn with all sorts of plastic and litter. This is without doubt the dirtiest beach I’ve seen yet in Vietnam. I’m not sure why the local council or beachside businesses can’t get this cleaned up, especially when the cafes and restaurants trade and make their money by being ‘on the beach.’ It’s almost scandalous that the beach area is such a disgrace when it has the potential to be gorgeous.

After a depressingly short stroll on the disgusting beach, I walk through town in search of food to cheer me up, stopping at a cosy little Plastic Chair Cafe. The lady owner gives me noodle soup along with a big side plate of mixed green salads and fresh herbs. She shows me that I have to pull all the coriander leaves from the stalk before adding them and just to tear up the lettucy-looking leaves and stir them in. This is a useful etiquette lesson for me as I usually just chuck everything straight into my noodle soup. She must think I’m completely clueless though, as she also motions for me to add the fish sauce and hot sauce for flavour. Once again, I know she’s only trying to be helpful, so I try not to feel too insulted.

Once I get back to the hotel I’m a little surprised to see how red my arms and face have become. One of my original sunscreens had run out and it appears that my cheap Vietnamese replacement just isn’t up to the job. There’s some things in life you can’t compromise on, and sunscreen is most definitely one of them. I’ll need to get back onto the good quality cream tomorrow for a big 100km day of sun and wind that will take me to Quy Nhon.

The following day I wake up feeling strangely listless, which isn’t ideal with a long day of strong headwinds looming. I’m trying to leave before 9.00am, although I’m really not in the mood, moving all my gear downstairs in instalments. At least my bike is still chained to the roof support outside.

For breakfast I return to the same Plastic Chair Cafe that served me dinner last night. The owner lady had offered me baguettes just before my noodle soup culinary lesson, so I’m hoping she’ll do Banh Mi this morning. I point to the baguettes and raise a couple of fingers to indicate that I’d like two, only for her to give me them dry with tomato and cucumber as a side. ‘Banh Mi ?’ I almost plead, before she fries up two eggs and pops them into the baguettes I’ve just opened. I scoff them down, even though I’m in no rush to get on the road. The headwind has started early again, and I know there’s nothing I can do but keep pedalling into it like an automaton.

A couple of hours into the day I notice some huge, shady trees to the side of a cafe and pull over for a breather. I stand in the shadows, reapply my sunscreen and drink a few mouthfuls of what is now lukewarm water. The cafe owner waits a couple of minutes then comes over and angrily motions for me to move on. The little bastard ! I give him a sarcastic Thumbs Up and an even more sarcastic ‘Thank You, Thank You !’ In hindsight I should have asked to come in for a coffee and then told him to Fuck Off. His rudeness has really pissed me off, although this anger does channel itself into getting the pedals turning.

For lunch I’m looking for somewhere that does rice meals, so I need to find a sign that says Co’m. I ride past signs that offer Bun (noodles) or Pho (soup), but I really fancy some rice to fill me up and give me energy. A Co’m sign eventually appears on the opposite side of the road, so I cross over and begin playing my familiar game of charades. I do my usual hand signals for ‘Can I eat?’ while the lady at the counter points to a tray that contains cooked chicken portions. I nod my head and take a seat. One of the owner’s little kids brings me some home-made iced tea, which is a real boon today and cools me down beautifully. I’ve ordered chicken, however I’m never exactly sure what form the meal will take until it arrives at my table. Today I get a plateful of chicken, rice, noodles and cucumber, along with a little side bowl of clear meat soup. Overall it’s a good feast, and sitting in the shade under a fan is just what I needed. The owner also coaxes me into buying a big bottled water as I leave, so I should be sorted for the rest of the day.

By mid-afternoon I’m starting to become lethargic and a little bit achy. My right shoulder feels like it has frozen shoulder, my legs are stiff and my hands now have a dull ache from constantly gripping the handlebars. And, of course, my butt is hurting too, despite me wearing three pairs of padded shorts and using a gel seat cover. By this point I’m making any excuse to stop and rest for a few minutes, whether it be reapplying sunscreen, drinking water or just taking random photos. One particular rest stop is justified though, as I’ve never seen a sight quite like it. There must be tens of thousands of red chillies lying on huge mats near the roadside, drying in the sun. A spectacular carpet of bright, brilliant red stretches for about fifty metres into the adjacent field. We’re right in the middle of dry season now, so they can be left out for days to ensure they lose all their moisture. I learn they can keep for over a year if they are dried properly. 

With about 20km to go I start to really struggle in the heat. I’m sweating like a fat pig and have to buy another two litres of water, having already drained the one I bought at lunchtime as well as three others. I keep pausing and forlornly checking Google Maps to see how much further the blue dot that represents my position has moved on. It’s creeping along horribly slowly, probably not helped by my constant stopping. I’m getting that almost dizzy, sickly feel each time I stop too. It’s not as bad as the day I arrived in Huế where I thought I might be physically sick, but it’s still not pleasant.

At the turn off for Quy Nhon I turn towards the coast and directly into the teeth of the headwind once again. I stop one final time for a breather and feel like the bones in my lower back are about to collapse on themselves. I’m wrecked. For the final couple of kilometres I turn North, which rather cruelly shows me the tailwind I would have had cycling in the opposite direction. I get to the Hoang Gia Homestay, which is more like a hotel above a coffee shop than a Homestay. The bloke who greets me says I can leave my bike outside on the pavement, but there’s absolutely no way I’m going to agree to that. He lets me wheel it in and leave it against the back wall of the coffee shop, telling me it will be safe there overnight. There is nothing to chain my bike to, so I have to be content with looping the chain through the frame and back wheel. The bike will now be awkward for someone to move, if nothing else. I’m slightly more reassured when the guy tells me there is always someone on duty, and that he actually sleeps on a bench in the cafe overnight. The family sit me down and feed me glasses of iced water, presumably because I look so exhausted.

Sadistically, they’ve given me a room on the second floor, so I take all my gear and lumber upstairs in heavy-legged slow motion. The shower switch is off in my room, so I click it on and then, frustratingly, have to wait the required fifteen minutes. I don’t want to lie on the pristinely white bed with my sweaty mess of a body, so I just lie on the bathroom floor, knackered, while the water heats up. I feel pretty faint after getting off the floor, but the rejuvenating powers of the warm shower seems to make today’s struggles disappear. 

Feeling much better I take a walk to the beach. It’s 5.00pm now and a fat, round moon is rising above the hills that form the North-East side of Quy Nhon Bay. There’s plenty of locals in the sea and on the sand, with football and beach volleyball proving popular. And after the repulsive shambles of yesterday’s beach, it’s so refreshing to see that Quy Nhon beach is in pristine condition. I just stop at a Banh Mi stall on the way home as it’s still too warm for a hot meal. Even then, I can feel sweat pouring off me as I sit there eating.

Back at my room I lie under luxuriant air-conditioning and reflect on what’s been a tough day. My plan was to avoid doing 100km days on this trip due to the heat and humidity. However, like a fool, I’ve now completed two of those long days and have genuinely struggled on both occasions. I really need to stop being such a twat and stick to shorter, more manageable days. I’ve only used half the time on my visa and am well over halfway down the country, so I’ve bought myself enough time to start taking it easy. With that in mind, tomorrow will definitely be a Rest Day. I feel so drained after today that I’m in bed and asleep by 8.30pm.

 

 

 

 

16th FEBRUARY 2019

My final breakfast at the Xanh Lá Homestay involves my new preferred food and drink options of Mi Quang and Iced Coffee. Normally I’m a tea drinker, but in Vietnam the double whammy of strong coffee hit, coupled with cold refreshing ice has me hooked. I always try to have condensed milk in my coffee, too – partly because fresh milk is so scarce, and partly because I need some form of sweetener to offset the bitterness of Vietnamese coffee. Before I leave the Homestay I get some pictures of the family posing with my bike. The grandfather comes outside in a white vest, smiles and asks ‘How are you ?’ like he always does. He then spends the next minute furiously patting down his hair so that he looks good for the photo. Like most of my Homestay families in Vietnam, they’ve been lovely.

I’m off on what should be a fairly easy 47km ride down the coast today. Hương tells me the route I’m taking is ‘not good’ as there are no shops or houses should I need any assistance. Nevertheless, I still take this quiet coastal road and find myself cycling through an arid and barren landscape soon after leaving town. The desolate feel of this area is compounded by a string of messy, home-made graveyards lining the roadside amongst scrubby trees and sand. Then a powerful, blustery headwind picks up. In a way this is good as it cools me down, but it also becomes a chore fighting against it as the day wears on. I plod on, realising that Hương was spot on with her assessment of this bleak and lonely road. The silver lining is that it’s quiet, with only a few scooters to keep me company.

I carry on down this empty road, being blasted by the headwind, until I reach the small fishing settlement of Tam Thanh. At the village centre I turn back towards the same direction I cycled from, before I find my Homestay accommodation along a narrow street that’s a mixture of homes and small farms. This place had received glowing reviews, scoring 9.8 out of 10 and being classified as ‘Exceptional’, so naturally my expectations are too high. It’s a nice two storey house, but it’s not amazing. The owner bloke just shows me upstairs and opens all the windows in my bedroom, allowing a strong sea breeze to rush through the room and cool it down.

I walk across the road and down to the village’s beach, weaving through a healthy population of fat, wooden fishing canoes. Getting into the sea seems pointless though, as the waves are so large and messy with the strong wind that I soon turn back inland in search of food. I’m walking past a Plastic Chair Cafe when an old lady beckons me in. There’s the usual language barrier, but I think I’ve managed to successfully put in an order for some more Mi Quang. I sit down, pour some of their home made tea into a glass over ice and await my new favourite dish. About ten minutes later the old lady is back and putting a huge bowl of cockles down in front of me. What the Fuck ? How have I ended up with cockles ? There has to be over fifty of them in there ! My pronunciation must be appalling if I’ve been given cockles while trying to order noodles. In my defence, Vietnamese is a language that uses six different speaking tones, so it’s very easy to get things wrong. Here a word can be spelt the same way but, when said in a rising, falling or neutral tone, can have three separate meanings. There’s a Vietnamese tongue-twister that goes ‘Bấy nay bây bày bảy bẫy bậy.’ It appears that the same word has just been repeated six times, but with the rising and falling pitches this actually translates as ‘All along you’ve set up the seven traps incorrectly!’ So, you can see why I make so many mistakes.

As I love shellfish anyway, I’m not too fazed by this turn of events. I’m more worried about how to tackle them with chopsticks, especially as I have an audience. Four old local blokes are sitting drinking beer at the table beside me and seem to have taken an interest in my predicament. One of them ambles over to show me how I should ladel some cockles from the large bowl into a smaller side bowl and eat them from there instead. Showing a grown man how to eat his food might be seen as piss-taking in some quarters, but on this occasion I know he’s just trying to help. My meal goes surprisingly smoothly, considering that I have to pick up each individual cockle and remove the meat from its shell with chopsticks. None of the old guys return to correct my eating habits, but they do ask me to have a beer with them so I must be doing something right.

Walking back to my Homestay through the tiny, one street village I’m amazed by how many people, especially kids, say Hello. They are disarmingly friendly and seem to love speaking to foreigners. I somehow can’t imagine kids in Britain showing quite the same interest in overseas visitors as I’ve received today. Back at the Homestay my bike is chained to the inside of the front yard perimeter fence. I’m not entirely comfortable with this so I lift it up to my room, in the process taking a small chunk out of the ceiling above the stairs with my pannier rack. Oops. Tomorrow’s weather forecast brings the uninspiring prediction of more gusty headwinds by early afternoon. Mornings always seem less breezy, so I might have to factor that into my cycling and haul myself out of bed a little bit earlier over the next few days.

The following morning I find that I needn’t have bothered setting an alarm because the local rooster starts cackling before sunrise. I grumpily open my window and look into the back garden below me to see if I can spot the noisy bird. All I can see are patches of fresh fruit and vegetables and skinny chickens running everywhere. My Homestay also produce and sell their own fish sauce, so opening the window does let in a rather distinctive aroma. The owner bloke isn’t around this morning, so I spend a good ten minutes trying to explain to his elderly mother that I need my passport back. Then it’s a further ten minutes waiting for her to locate it for me. Most of my waiting time involves playing high-fives with her grandchildren.

I roll down the settlement’s main street, getting more ‘Hellos’ from practically everyone I pass. It’s a great way to start the day, and really good for the soul to see so many friendly people. Within two hundred metres I’ve bought some bottled water from a little grocery shack, and then just across the street there’s a Plastic Chair Cafe for breakfast. I’m completely sorted for everything I’ll need today within five minutes of leaving my accommodation. The cafe is run by an amiable couple in their thirties, who serve me up a beef noodle soup and big jug of tea for the equivalent of 65p. The lady in particular speaks reasonable English, so it’s nice to have a proper chat before I leave.

To leave town I retrace my final few kilometres from yesterday, before taking a wrong turn and going straight through the city of Tam Ky instead of bypassing it. A young couple on a scooter slow down to my pace and chat with me as I make my way through the traffic. He tells me that he’s studying in Ho Chi Minh City, although they are both from Tam Ky originally. When I tell him about my trip he’s utterly astonished that I’m cycling such a distance through their country. Then, after negotiating the city, it’s back onto the busy old QL1A road yet again.

A couple of hours later I stop for lunch at a large Plastic Chair Cafe, where I have chicken and rice while inadvertently amusing the owner’s kids. Ironically, they are actually doing their English homework while I’m eating, and the parents encourage then to practice on me. I get a few decent attempts at ‘How are you?’ and ‘What is your name?’ questions, but they just go all shy and giggly when I reply. The youngest child, who looks about eight, is getting very animated and I hear him whispering ‘Slender Man !’ to his brother while looking at me with some degree of panic. Slender Man is a sinister fictional character with no facial features; a tall, thin bogey-man who terrorises children, so I’m happy to see my presence has left an impression on the poor kid.

As promised, a strong headwind blows in after lunch, which results in me trundling my way lethargically towards Quang Ngai. The last quarter of today’s cycle sees me trudging along in slow motion and making plenty of pit-stops for the most banal of reasons. It’s not exactly been a struggle, just a very, plodding and wind-hampered 70km. When I reach Quang Ngai, I make for the Thanh Lich Guesthouse, which has received rave reviews, primarily because of the hosts. The lady owner speaks almost no English, but greets me warmly with a plate of Oreo biscuits and a much-needed bottle of chilled water. She takes me upstairs and shows me the room that I had originally booked, before saying I can have the larger, riverview room instead. I notice that the owners have already turned on the shower switch prior to my arrival, which is a nice touch. With Vietnamese accommodation the shower switch is normally turned off as a money saving measure. This means that when you first arrive at your accommodation, you have to turn the shower switch on yourself, and then wait ten to fifteen minutes before the water heats up. It did take me a couple of cold showers at the start of the trip to work this out, mind you.

After my shower I head back downstairs and get to meet Ron, the husband. I’m just getting ready to shake his hand and introduce myself, when he beats me to it and greets me with a huge hug instead. He’s a stocky, muscly bloke in a white vest and seems like he is the happiest person on the planet, smiling almost continuously. Again, like his wife, he speaks virtually no English, but with Google translate and a willingness to be patient, we get along fine. He tells me my bike will be safe downstairs, standing unlocked between the motorbikes that the Guesthouse rents out. ‘No Problem’ he says, like every Vietnamese person does when I ask about the safety of my bike.

For dinner I take a short walk and find a Plastic Chair Cafe that serves up my second beef noodle soup of the day. I don’t mind the repetition as it’s probably one of the best I’ve had, with unusually tender meat in a rich, tasty broth. It’s hot though, both in terms of spiciness and temperature – sweat is beading up on my forehead and I can feel droplets trickling down my sides. The attentive lady owner keeps refilling my tea cup from a cute metal teapot that looks like it should be a family heirloom.

I return to the Guesthouse, where Ron greets me with a huge smile and a big hug once again, as if I were a long lost relative. His friendliness is infectious. He shows me how he will feed a thick metal chain through the rear wheels of his line of motorbikes later so they can’t be stolen. My bike will be part of this secure line up too, chained to motorbikes on either side, and I know that this reassurance will mean a much better sleep for me tonight.

 

 

14th FEBRUARY 2019

I’m downstairs for my final Homestay breakfast in Da Nang, thinking that once again Lin will have left all the ingredients out for me. Instead, she has ridden her scooter back from work just so she can prepare breakfast for myself and one other Chinese guest. I’m almost embarrassed by her level of helpfulness, which goes far, far beyond what I’d expect from any accommodation. She also allows me to remain at their house until noon as today’s short trip means I’m able to start cycling later. When it does come time for me to depart, Lin shows up yet again on her scooter just so she can say Goodbye. I’m astounded by her attentiveness, although she could just be checking that I’m not making off with half the household possessions.

I leave Da Nang via the Dragon Bridge, as I need to get some daytime pictures of this bizarre spectacle, then continue riding South. About 10km further on I reach the Marble Mountains site, which Lin had recommended I stop at. There are five large, rocky hills that are home to Buddhist temples, pagodas, tunnels, caves and even steps up the inside of one mountain. It sounds like a place worth exploring, but when I arrive there’s an absolute glut of tourist buses at the entrance and an army of street hawkers shouting at me. I really can’t be doing with this, so I simply turn around and head straight off again.

Today I’m taking the coastal route to Hoi An, thankful that I’ve no need to go near the busy QL1A road. It’s only a 25km cycle, so I trundle along, stop for a Banh Mi lunch and reach the outskirts of Hoi An before I know it. I find my way to the Xanh Lá Homestay which, with its colour scheme, almost certainly translates as Green House. The owners are lovely, and have three generations of their family living in a two storey house next to the rooms. I chain my bike to a palm tree in their front yard, before settling into one of the larger and more modern rooms I’ve had on this trip. This place is classed as ‘Budget’ on my accommodation website, but it feels like luxury to me. The shower head is wider than I am.

Later I go for a walk into Hoi An’s Old Town for some food and stop at a restaurant that overlooks the wide, lazy Thu Bồn river. I order Mi Quang, which I’m told is a noodle dish peculiar to Central Vietnam. It’s basically wide, flat noodles with prawns and veggies in a tasty, yellowy broth. For a texture contrast it’s topped off with peanuts and a handful of crispy rice crackers. Wow, that’s bloody delicious ! When I’m done I order a beer and sit and people-watch the pavement out front and the river beyond. As darkness begins to fall every vessel on the river turns on it’s colourful lights and lanterns, so that the whole area becomes a picture of bobbing reds, pinks, greens and blues. It’s a magical sight. The restaurant has some really chilled, hypnotic Asian music playing too, which adds to the whole ambience. I order another beer. I’m having one of those ‘moments in time’ I get on cycle trips where there’s nowhere else in the world I’d rather be right now. I sit there happy as a clam and soak up the surroundings.

I toy with having another beer, but instead I take a walk along the riverside. My God, it’s busy ! There are throngs of tourists everywhere, meaning I can barely move faster than a shuffle. Nearly every street has displays of coloured lanterns strung above them and people are paying to release floating candles down the river. I walk across a wooden bridge to an island where Hoi An’s famous lantern shops are situated and try to take some arty photos of the vivid, multi-coloured globes. I spend a while just wandering around and taking in the sights before walking back to the Homestay, feeling totally at peace with the world.

Breakfast the following morning is taken at a table outside my room and consists of an apple-heavy bowl of fruit with yoghurt and a mixed fruit shake. Although this is a remarkably healthy option for me, I have to say I’ve still been eating a lot better on this trip than I normally do. Usually I’m devouring heaps of chocolate and biscuits for energy, but this time I’ve not strayed far from a diet of noodles, rice, meat, veggies and fruit. I’m not even missing or thinking about the naughty food, so I suppose that’s got to be a good thing.

The grandfather of the house is a kindly old gent who smiles and asks ‘How are you?’ every time I see him, although that seems to be the limit of his English. His daughter, Hương, tells me that he fought in the Vietnam War when he was fourteen years old, in the vast system of tunnels near Ho Chi Minh City that the Viet Cong used for shelter, storage and supply routes. In those days kids would live in the skinniest of tunnels for days on end, alongside stinging ants and mosquitos, only popping up at night to forage for food or to shoot Americans. If they were spotted they would retreat to their tunnels and pull the earth roof back over their heads. Most times the Americans had no clue that they were so close. Hương tells me that ‘We followed Uncle Ho’, meaning that her father fought for North Vietnam under Ho Chi Minh. It’s almost incomprehensible that this was the life of a fourteen year old kid during that war. He wasn’t forced to do this though, he proudly volunteered to fight for his country. Despite all their firepower, the Americans severely underestimated the spirit and courage of ordinary Vietnamese.

A little cycle in and around Hoi An is as far as I get today. I take a spin to the beach, where a bloke wants money from me just for parking my bike, so I move on purely out of principle. Then a beachside Banh Mi stall charges 30,000 Vietnamese Dong for one Banh Mi, whereas yesterday I got TWO for 20,000 ! Because I’m at the beach and because Hoi An is such a tourist trap, consequently things are much more expensive. In a strong headwind I ride down to the river mouth, past plush resorts on the water’s edge that offer no access to the beach beyond them. Then it’s back to town on a raised road through a sea of flooded green rice fields. Groups of women in wide, conical hats are back-breakingly bent over and tending to the crop. It makes for a great photograph but it must be tough, arduous work.

In the afternoon I take a siesta in true Vietnamese style, before having a little chat outside with the lady from the room next door. She’s a seventy-five year old Canadian who runs a clothing shop in Canada and spends every winter in Hoi An sourcing clothes to ship back home. (Hoi An is also famous for tailored clothes, as well as lanterns.) A recent hip operation hasn’t slowed her down, although she has been confined to a ground floor room while she recovers. After our chat she collars me to lift some of her heavy possessions up to the first floor where she’ll be moving shortly.

For dinner I walk back towards town and stop at a Plastic Chair Cafe a little bit before the Old Town. Because it’s not on the riverside it doesn’t come with the same tranquil view as last night’s meal, although it is much better value for money. I get a noodle dish, seven small spring rolls and a soft drink for around £3.00. Afterwards I walk into the lantern-filled Old Town again, where the mass tourist hordes are already starting to gather. Whereas last night I was at one with the universe, tonight I just can’t be arsed manouvering through all the bodies. Although Hoi An is a lovely spot, the sheer volume of tourists would get very annoying, very quickly. I return to the sanctity of my Homestay, which is just far enough from the Old Town to allow for a lovely quiet night.

 

13th FEBRUARY 2019

I’m downstairs for breakfast at 8.30am, just as Lin has requested. She’s just about to leave for work, but has left me all the ingredients for a beef noodle soup on the kitchen table. All I have to do is put my ingredients into a bowl and pour boiling water over them. Even with this simple task she doesn’t depart until she’s happy that I know what I’m doing. This will be the first time that I’ve (knowingly) drunk Vietnamese tap water on this trip, although I’m not overly worried at this point as Lin’s tap does have a filter attachment.

In the morning I go to meet an Aussie bloke named Lee, a fellow cycle tourer from the Warmshowers website. He isn’t able to host cyclists as his apartment is too small, so instead we catch up for a coffee across the road from where he lives. He’s a big lad for a cyclist and, in his own words, ‘likes to have only slightly more cycling days than rest days’ when touring. He also tells me that he doesn’t enjoy hills or exerting himself too much, yet he still managed a 1,000km trip down the coast from Da Nang to Ho Chi Minh City. This is the same route I’ll be taking so I load up on information as well as a couple of coconut iced coffees. He’s an interesting guy too, having worked as a teacher in Vietnam for the past seventeen years. Currently he teaches foreign applicants how to pass their English Language exam as part of the Australian citizenship process. He does all this via Skype whilst living in Da Nang, and hasn’t taught in a classroom for three years now. His next big cycle trip will be from Athens to Croatia, so I’m able to pass on tips from my European cycle, while he clues me up about what to expect in Southern Vietnam.

I’m back at the Homestay around mid-day, with the intention of cycling out to see the massive white Lady Buddha statue just along the coast. However, after getting back I start to feel a bit weird and weak, like my stomach is playing up. I begin to wonder if this is a result of Lin’s tap water this morning, or maybe even the ice in my coconut coffees. Part of me wants to go and lie down for an hour, but then I’d probably fall asleep and miss seeing the Lady Buddha statue and pagoda if I did. So, even though I’m feeling slightly crap, I know I should make the effort.

The Lady Buddha statue is 8km from my Homestay, but it’s huge, white form is visible on a hill to my left as soon as I reach the seafront. I’m dawdling along painfully slowly though, feeling faint and with my stomach churning like a washing machine. I carry on to the end of the beach, past seafood restaurants and a flotilla of small fishing boats at the sheltered North end of the bay. The road then twists along the rocky coastline of the Son Tra Peninsula, with a handful of hot climbs that I struggle up sluggishly in my delicate state. I’m not sure if my perspiration is down to cold sweats or the baking heat. At the top I leave my bike with the car park attendant and walk round the Linh Ung pagoda first. Architecturally it’s all curved roofs and dragon sculptures, giving the impression it has stood here for centuries, when in fact it was only completed in 2010.

All the while I’m moving round the pagoda grounds I keep catching glimpses of the giant Lady Buddha statue a little further up the hill. I make my way towards it, staying in the shade as much as I can, before reaching the level ground of the temple complex. The colossal statue in the centre is an impressive sixty-seven metres high, making it the tallest Buddha statue in Vietnam. This gleaming white hunk of marble stands overlooking Da Nang Bay and is meant to help protect sailors and fishermen in the waters below. There are seventeen floors inside the statue, each one representing a different Buddha, but that’s a climb too far for me with the way I’m feeling today. I content myself with ground-level temples and the amazing views over Da Nang city, before retrieving my bike and freewheeling back downhill. On the way back I start to feel a bit better too, as if I’ve managed to walk off that slight feeling of nausea. I stop at a Plastic Chair Cafe beside a lake, where a seat and a couple of Banh Mi seems to bring me back to normal. As suddenly as I felt shit this lunchtime, I feel better just as quickly now.

I take a walk across the river and into Da Nang city in the late afternoon as I need to get a couple of spare inner tubes. My current spares sit at the bottom of my panniers each day, virtually forgotten about, so it took me a while to realise that two were actually the wrong size. It’s lucky I’ve not needed them thus far, as I’m sure twenty-six inch inner tubes won’t fit twenty-eight inch wheels. Darkness has fallen by the time I get the spares and have some dinner, so I make my way back via the illuminated Dragon Bridge. I’d seen this quirky-looking crossing from the next bridge on the river as I walked into town, so made a point of walking over it on my way back. The dragon is quite a sight, spanning the entire bridge, with three long humps in the middle like a Loch Ness monster. There’s a tail on the city side and an enormous dragon head on the other, all brilliantly lit up at night and changing colours from golden to green to blue. The dragon is also programmed to breathe fire and spray water, but apparently only on weekend nights. I’m here slap bang in the middle of the week, unfortunately.

After crossing the bridge I walk along the riverside, passing restaurants, food stalls and a gigantic carp-dragon fountain spraying a tumbling arc of water into the river. When I get back to the Homestay the kids are in the lounge. Michael is studying again, while Cherry has come out of her shell completely, showing off that she knows her colours in English and that she can count up to ten. She’ll probably be fluent before she’s in high school with all the English speaking guests they get at the Homestay. I sit chatting with the family for a while, with Lin constantly feeding me biscuits and water, Michael studying and Cherry high-fiving me at every opportunity. They’re a lovely bunch so I’m not fussed about having a late night, especially as I’ve only got a 25km ride down the coast to Hoi An tomorrow.