Day 11
I had to get up early again today, as I booked myself onto the “booze cruise” tour. A boat trip to four of the nearby islands of Nha Trang. It turned out to be a great day to do the boat trip, a lot of sun and no rain what so ever. We first headed out to the first island where we stopped for an hour. There we got some snorkeling gear to check out the coral near the coast line.
The coral wasn’t very spectacular, but it was still nice to see. Later on we chilled out on the beach in the sun. On the boat I met a few British guys of which one, Paul, I met in the hostel in Saigon. Once we came back on the boat, lunch was ready. A big table full of delicious Vietnamese seafood. It was so much that we couldn’t finish it all.
After lunch the captain and tour guide transformed into an actual music band. The captain was playing the electrical guitar, another guy played the drums. Another crew member dressed up like a lady boy and started to do some singing. Of all the things I expected of this trip, this was the last thing. It turned out to be really funny, especially when they were asking the different nationalities to sing a song in their own language.
After this entertainment we were all allowed to jump off the boat and relax in a tube. One of the crew members was sitting in a floating platform and was handing out shots of wodca. We had some of the drinks and then went back on the boat to head over to the next island.
This island was very tame, we were able to do some water sports like but we chose not to and just have a beer in one of the beach chairs. Afterwards we headed back to the harbour. Once back I found that my whole back had burned. I had a little nap and then went to buy some sun screen.
Afterwards I had some food in one of the many restaurants. After dinner I bumped into Bekky and Abby, two British girls I had met in Saigon. I tagged along with them and we went to have some drinks in the bars. It turned out to be a good night with a lot of booze.
Day 12
The next day I chose to move hostels. The hostel I was staying in was nice, but very quiet. Evemthough my private dorm room was quite nice,. I didn’t meet any people. After moving to the hostel next door I booked myself onto the mud baths tour. I went together with a couple from Australia and two girls from the States.
The mud baths were situated in an luxury outdoor Spa. It was built on a hill and on every level of the hill were baths filled with mud and special mineral water. First we had a mineral shower, then we had a mud bath. After the mud bath we had to sit in the sun to let the mud dry. Afterwards we cleaned ourselves underneath the mineral showers again.From there we headed into the mineral baths to relax.
Thereafter we got to a mineral swimming pool which was about 40 degrees. Once we were in we basically didn’t want to get out of it again. We stayed there for a good hour. We then decided to head back to the hostel.
Once back me and the Australian couple went out for some food in town. We chose to have some non-Vietnamese food as we were kind of fed up with eating rice all day long. After dinner I went to my room for a little nap. Later that night I met up with Paul and the British girls in one of the bars. All the bars are trying to compete and offer free shots to get in. I soon found out the shots weren’t all that great, but the rum-coke buckets for $2 were pretty good.
Later on we met three Russian girls (Nha Trang is full of Russians). They asked me and Paul whether we wanted to come with them to the ancient towers the next morning. Even though it was already 4am, we agreed to meet them at 10am the next morning.
Day 13
The next morning I woke up by my alarm. I woke up Paul, who was still asleep in the room. We had a quick shower and met up with the Russian girls. Another Spanish guy who agreed to come along too made it too in time.
We then grabbed a taxi and headed over to the ancient towers. The towers turned out to be quite nice. After seeing Angkor Wat they were not all that impressive, but still nice to check out. The Russian girl, Nadia, acted as a tour guide with her guide book and told us some stuff about the towers.
After the ancient towers we sat down at one of the street stalls. A big Vietnamese woman was stirring in a big pan of noodles. We ordered some noodle soup with fish cake. It was fun to for once not sit in an actual tourist restaurant, but eat with the locals on the street at an incredibly low plastic table.
After lunch we walked around for a long while to find some special rocks. The Russian girl had read about the rock. After an hour of walking we finally found it. We then first had a drink and played a card game the Russian girl had brought with her. Afterwards we headed to the rock. We were amazed we had to pay 21.000 VND ($1) to walk on the rocks, but we agreed to do it anyway. The rocks were nice, but I wasn’t sure why we had to pay money for them, but thats basically how Vietnam works I suppose.
We then headed back to town. Just when we arrived with the taxi I bumped into the British girls who were just about to book a snorkeling trip. One of their friends, Lewis, was going to do some diving. I figured in that case to book a diving trip too. I went with them into the offfice and booked two fun dives for the next day.
I then headed back to the hostel. There I bumped into Vanessa, another British girl I met in Saigon. She had just arrived and was about to head out for some food. I had a shower too and then waited for her and her friend to get ready.
We headed out for some Vietnamese food in one of the restaurants. Later we went out for some drinks, but the town was very quiet. It turned out one of the important public figures, the highest Vietnamese general during the war, had passed away at age 102. They told me out of respect the whole country was going to mourn for three days which included no loud music and no waterpark where I wanted to go to the next day at first.
Afer a few drinks we headed back to the hostel, as I needed to be fresh and fruity the next day to go on my diving trip.
Day 14
The day started early as I had to be at the dive shop at 8am. I made it just in time. On the trip were Bekky and Abby, Lewis and two American guys. The girls went snorkeling while we were doing our diving. The first dive turned out to be interesting, as the visibility was only about 4 or 5 meters. We did see a lot of fish, but it isn’t great to dive when you have such low visibility.
The second dive turned out to be much better. We had about 10 to 12 meters of visibility. Again we saw a lot of fish and some coral. We were down for nearly an hour, which was good. It was just great to do some diving again as it had already been 2 years when I did my last dive.
After the diving we headed back to Nha Trang. From there I went to have some seafood lunch with Bekky, Abby and Lewis. Me and Abby shared some king prawns and squid, which was very tasty. Afterwards I went back to the hostel to relax and have a shower. I had heard that the waterpark was going to be open the next day, so I changed my hostel booking and bus ticket so I could spend one more night in Nha Trang.
That night I went to have some food at the fancy Sailing Club with an Australian girl in my hostel. She oredered a whole crab which was really impressive. I chose to eat some beef, but the crab was so much food that that the girl, Elena, offered me to help out with the crab.
Afterwards we had some drinks in the Sailing Club and Elena met up with a Canadian girl who was on holiday with her mom and grandma. We had some drinks in the Sailing Club but later we headed back to Oasis, the bar most of the backpackers go to. There I met up with the British girls and the Russian girls. It became another long night with lots of rum – coke buckets. We finished the night off with a hot dog.
Day 15
This morning I woke up fairly early again, as we were going to the waterpark. The waterpark has been built on an actual island. A ski lift has been built across the water to bring visitors to the amusement park. The waterpark and amusement park were good, but unfortunately the rides were only open for an hour and then shut down again to open another ride.
One of the rides turned out to be really scary, we sat down in some sort of courasel which started to spin really fast and then went upside down. We were hanging into the safety bar and all I could think was, if this bar opens we will all fall out. Normally I don’t have those thoughts, but this time I remembered I was in Vietnam. Thankfully the ride was fine and we survived.
After the rides in the amusement park we went over to the water park. The slides turned out to be really fun, but again only some of them were open and the ones that were open were only open at certain moments during the day.We spent a few good hours going down the slides which was good fun. Afterwards we headed back to the hostel as we were catching an overnight bus to Hoi An that night.\
Once back I had quick shower, packed my stuff and waited for the bus to come and pick me up. Thankfully the bus turned out to be quite good with good seats and air conditioning. Abby and Bekky were in the seats just behind me which was quite a coincedence. I was pretty tired, so I didn’t have much problems sleeping.
Day 16
The next morning I woke up at 6am, because the bus stopped. It turned out all the buses in front of us had stopped, so it became a long row of busses standing still. It was raining really hard and there was quite a bit of wind. I had heard about a typhoon that was expected to get to Hoi An that night, so we figured it had something to do with that. The bus driver didn’t speak English so he couldn’t tell me what was going on.
We ended up sitting and waiting for almost 4 hours on the bus without knowing what was going on. We then finally started to drive again and soon enough we found out why we had to wait. We basically waited for the typhoon to hit the town. It was sad to see the town was completely wrecked. Trees were in the road, power cables were hanging loose and the big bus was trying to manouvre through the mayhem. After about 16 hours we finally arrived in Hoi An.
More adventures soon from Hoi An!
Oct 9th 2013 – Oct 14th 2013
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