In Da Lat

After a four hour bus ride we are in Da Lat, in the highlands of Vietnam, at an elevation of 4,928 feet. We went from sea level to here in one short ride. It is considerably cooler here and seems to rain every afternoon.

It is so much nicer here. This is the honeymoon capitol of Vietnam. So there is a lot of young love here. This is a city of excellent French food and architecture. Most new hotels are in the French Colonial chalet style with a high peaked roof lines and are painted off white, cream, or yellow.

The French colors for their colonies was yellow and green, and the new mansions being built by wealthy Vietnamese can be painted any color even bright green. Our first trip to Da Lot was in 2008 and the town has grown a lot since. It is no longer a sleepy little village, but a busy city. There are hotels everywhere for honeymooners and tourists. Everyone seems to want a look at this quaint place. Yesterday we had coffee with rum at a restaurant on the shores of the lake in the center of town and we watched both young lovers and kids paddling in swan paddle boats.

We visited The Crazy House which is Da Lot's number one tourist attraction. I took a photo of the architect who is continuing to add on to the house and has now added more gift shops.

We are staying at the River Palace Hotel. This hotel is excellent and has a good breakfast and is in the center of town. We can walk in any direction and from our window we can see the Da Lat Easy Rider Headquarters. That is a motorcycle club with members all over Southeast Asia. We have seen some club rides as we travel. In Penang we saw a Muslim Harley Davidson riding club arriving at the hotel we were staying. All the women were seated behind their husbands and when the women took their helmets off, they were wearing Haley Davidson handkerchiefs as headscarves to cover their hair in proper Muslim fashion. The food here is also wonderful. After we arrived we ate our fist meal at the Art Cafe and I had fish in clay pot brown sauce served with brown almost red rice, which was an excellent combination. We now have eaten twice at the Long Hoa, Restaurant de Famille. Yesterday had barbecued beef wrapped in lot leaf, which is a pepper leaf. Today I had strips of chicken breasts served over lightly sautéed sweet onions instead of rice. I must do this at home. After lunch Jim bought a pomelo, which is thought to be the ancestor to the grapefruit but much larger and sweeter. He tried to cut it open and failed so I took it to the hotel kitchen and the chief chef took a cleaver out and cut the fruit into the shape of a square, and then shaped it into a ball. She then began peeling the sections. I then took it back to the room to eat. The chef said our pomelo was young and next time we should pick a fruit that is shiny green and then would have a thinner skin. I must talk about the Da Lot wine. We drink the Da Lat red wine that is made from cardinal grapes and mulberries. We are even buying dried mulberries in the market to eat as our snack. We like this city.

In Nha Trang

We are in Nha Trang, the diving capitol of Vietnam. We took a five hour bus ride from Quy Nhon on our bright green Mailinh bus. The bus company picked us up in a van at our hotel and took us to the bus station where we caught the "big" bus to Nha Trang. The trip ended at the Nha Trang bus terminal where we caught a taxi to our hotel. So, we are here.

In Quy Nhon

After spending four nights in Hoi An, we caught a taxi to Da Nang and then a train to Quy Nhon. The train ride was an uneventful six hours. this is a very pleasant non-touristy town on the coast of Vietnam, halfway between Da Nang and Nha Trang. We originally stopped here to break up the long trip between Nha Trang and Dan Nang/Hoi An and discovered we liked the city. So, we come back. We have a hotel, The Sunflowers, overlooking the beach where we can watch the fishermen in their round boats and enjoy the beach.

In Hoi An

We took the Green Train sleeper from Hanoi to Hoi An. The trip was uneventful. We had a four person cabin to the three of us. We only bought three berths but the fourth was empty the whole trip. There was a lady and her daughter that were assigned to it, but when they came to the cabin in Hanoi, she wanted to switch to a lower berth from the upper she had a ticket for, and we refused. Then her daughter threw up on the floor, and we never saw her in our cabin again. She found a lower berth in another cabin. Hoi An is the city that tourists most love. It's another UNESCO World Heritage site and is really pleasant. It's also the home for the "Want to buy a Suit? Dress? Pants?" tourist industry in Vietnam. This time Jim succumbed and ordered a cotton skirt, oops, kilt. So, we'll see how it looks.

Ha Long Bay

We booked a tour to Ha Long Bay for two days and one night. For the one night we stayed on a boat somewhere in Ha Long Bay. The bus ride from Hanoi to Ha Long City took four hours and then we boarded the boat. Because we booked a tour we were picked up at our hotel and traveled with fifteen other people, most of whom were young enough to be our grandchildren.

We were talking to one very enjoyable lady from London who mentioned her 67 year old grandmother. But, we all got along quite well. We even met with two of the group for drinks later in Hanoi.

Since we were here four years ago the government has decreed that all the tourist boats must be painted white, completely destroying the ambiance of the boats that were painted different colors. The trip itself was wonderful. Last time we spent a second night on Cat Ba Island, but this time we opted to go back to Hanoi. Ha long Bay is a UNESCO World heritage site and deserves it. The islands jutting up from the water are amazing. There is another bay further north that is just starting to get tourists and is where we will probably go to next time.

In Hanoi

We are in Hanoi, Vietnam. We took an Air Asia flight from Bangkok to here. We arrived an hour before Joyce's flight from the U.S. so we waited for an hour at the airport and met her. We all took a car provided by our hotel to the hotel. It is a lot cooler here than it was in Bangkok.

We are now in the land of good $2 bottles of wine, which Vang Da Lat, which is bottled in Da Lat, the honeymoon capitol of Vietnam.

We are staying in the old quarter, which is a crowded, chaotic area. We really enjoy hanoi, hope Joyce does also.

In Bangkok III

We are back in Bangkok. We took an eight hour bus ride from Udon Thani to Bangkok. The bus evvn provided a meal. it was a fast and easy trip on a bus that could have used new shock absorbers.

While In Bangkok we got our yellow fever shots to go to Africa. We also ended up getting two other shots that had expired. We went to the Thailand Red Cross and they were great. Almost painless shots.