from nha trang to hoi an, with the baby blue cords to prove it

we have spent the past three days in the town of hoi an, which is about halfway up the country, near the coast. we flew from nha trang to da nang, just north of here and then shared a cab to hoi an with the chattiest canadian on earth and the most silent brit on earth, who just happen to also be a (seemigly odd) couple. we got to town with a mission to find a hotel with a decent bathroom. after a night at dong phunog 2 hotel in nha trang, we had set our standards a bit higher. the let's go for some unexplainable reason gave our friend dong phuong it's coveted thumbs up icon... we're not sure if it was the scuzzy old blanket we had to share (without even a top sheet - which are hard to come by here - as a buffer) or the carpet art that adorned the breakfast room wall that set it apart from the competition, but either way we couldn't get away from the phuong fast enough.

when we got to hoi an, we looked at one hotel that was also given a hearty thumbs up by the folks at let's go - we hadn't quite given up hope on them yet - but it proved to be musty and not that appealing. so i left brendan at a coffee shop and set off to find something that would do. eventually i got us a big room with a river view that didn't quite meet the clean bathroom requirement, but i was tired and hot and the lady who ran the place was nice. the only downside was that it was only available for one night, so we would have to go through the whole charade again the next day. we enjoyed our one night there, and set off the next morning to find something else in the general vicinity of the river, which is a little more relaxed than being right in the middle of the tourist zone. enter vietnam village resort. the strangest - STRANGEST - place i will likely ever stay.

we paid $25 for a room that had it's own balcony surrounded by palm fronds, a bathroom cleaner and more modern than anything we have seen since leaving the U.S. of A. (and even there, we would be hard pressed to find a hotel with a loo this nice) and beautiful bamboo furniture. considering we had paid the same price the night before for some mildew and a lot of traffic noise, it didn't really add up, but we went for it and signed on for 2 nights of blissfully scalding water and a sparkling tub. over the course of our 48 hours there, we never saw another guest - and are pretty sure that we were in fact the main event. there also seemed to be a strict energy conservation policy in place, since every time we walked into the vast lobby/restaurant building, all of the lights were off with the staff of 6-10 young ladies sitting the dark awaiting our return so they would finally have something to do. i almost wished i could keep them busy with something other than handing us our room key, which took approximately 1.5 seconds. on day #2 we got back to the lobby to find a delightful exception to the fierce conservation of electricity -- we were greeted by none other than a life-sized, motion-activated, singing and dancing santa. the folks at vietnam village might be stingy, but they know how to splurge with their energy budget. we enjoyed our stay there, though i will forever wonder a) how on earth they stay in business and b) whether there was a multiple homicide the day before we got there and we were the only people not to know about it.

in other hoi an news, this is THE PLACE to have clothes and shoes made. i came armed with a photo of a dress from an anthropologie catalog - another helpful suggestion from my friend who had been to vietnam before - and set off to find someone to make it for me at 1/10 the cost with my choice of fabric. there are tailors everywhere... about 80% of the storefronts are either tailors or shoemakers, some of them approaching you with the unassuming "quick look at my store please" and others with the more cut-to-the-chase line of "buy something"... so it was hard to decide where to go. ultimately, i was picky about the fabric options so we ended up with a very touchy-feely young lass at the cloth market who agreed to make me two dresses for $36. they came out pretty well, but the fun part was going to pick them up and seeing brendan get sucked into the allure of having things custom made. he (with my urging) picked out some lovely baby blue curdoroy for circa-1980 style pants that we would come back to pick up in two hours. between the pants and the additional alterations to my dresses, i'm not sure how she managed it, but she did. and we are now big fans of anh at cloth market stall #52. sure part of one of my dresses is a bit uneven, but isn't that the experience of hand made goods? i'm telling myself it is.

we also did a super-tourist excursion to my son yesterday, which is the site of ancient ruins about 40km from hoi an. we went out by bus, traipsed around with hordes of other tourists and took a boat most of the way back to hoi an. the ruins are a UNESCO world heritage site, dating from the 4th century. they were pretty amazing, particularly given the lush mountainous setting surrounding them, but i would probably have been more amazed minus the hundreds of other tourists running around at the same time.

we learned partway into our stay in hoi an that the town is not in its typically UNESCO-maintained (the town itself also had the designation) condition from some tourists from florida - who were, by they way, a RIOT - who had been here before. we had learned when we first arrived that there was some flooding here, but then proceeded to walk around town oblivious to the major road and sidewalk repairs going on all around us and making what most would say an obvious connection between facts A and B. not always the most astute of travelers. compared to da lat, hoi an seems to be teeming with tourists, but the floridian seniors tell us that it's empty compared to the last time they were here, since tourists were encouraged not to come given the flood damage. there is an old japanese covered bridge in town where there is one line marking the level of the flood waters from a flood in 1999, and a second - higher - line marking the water level from the flood two weeks ago. despite our initial and prolonged oblivion, we now get it that this was a serious-ass flood. part of the tourist privilege, i suppose, to take in the beauty of a place but be unaffected by the ravages of such events.

there is more to report, but my hands are getting tired from typing away on a less-than-responsive keyboard. we continue to work on our haggling skills, and brendan has done his best to bring the "buy one, get one" concept to this part of the world, but apparently it doesn't translate. they don't seem to buy into the idea of our agreeing to their price for the first item, and then suggesting that they give us a large discount on the second item, but i suspect he will keep on trying.

this afternoon we head 3 hours north on a bus to hue, the culinary capital of vietnam. it will be interesting to try some new options from that region. thus far, my only true love is vietnamese coffee, and i have vowed to start buying condensed milk by the case to make it myself at home. there is something so right about concentrated milk and sugar. we tried cao lau, a regional specialty from hoi an, a couple of times. not my favorite, particularly the vegetarian version i had our first night here. the menu described the elements of the dish, with the base of the broth being water from the - and i quote - "local bale well". i don't know what a bale well is, and from the taste of the broth i don't think i want to. so here's hoping for some delectable hue goodies once we get through another round of the hair-raising experience that is motorized transport in vietnam.

70km on a bike, with the sore legs to prove it

we rode our bikes from the central highlands to the coast today. this sounds more dramatic than it actually was (or would if you were looking at a map of vietnam), since the comfort van that followed us for the entire ride drove us 45 minutes out of da lat to the starting point, and then drove us another 30 minutes to the coast at the end. okay, so we rode from the the central highlands to the general vicinity of the coast today. it ended up being just the two of us on the trip, and our guide vien who does outdoor excursions up to seven days a week to make his living. this should give some indication of how in-shape vien was in comparison to us. we do not do outdoor excursions for a living. but we hung in there -- i whooped up on brendan on all of the uphill climbs, and he zoomed by me on all of the downhills, leaving me to follow clinging with a death grip on my brakes. they didn't get much of a rest on the 30km descent through vietnam's newest national park.

it was an awesome ride, passing through incredibly diverse terrain as we went from a 1500 meter elevation down to sea level. we also passed through a number of rural villages, which was a great treat since we have thus far seen much less remote parts of the country. by the end i was a little tired of responding to all of the hello's from the countless kids we saw a long the way, but brendan was in it for the long haul. i heard him singing out cheerful "sin chao"s (we added word #2 to our vocabulary today!) to all of the onlookers we passed until the bitter end. it did seem to be the event of the week to have the crazy bikers coming through... vien said that 99% of the tourists they get on their adventure tours are foreign, and when he tells vietnamese people what he does for a living it takes a lot of explaining. we were certainly a novelty act today.

we are spending the evening in the beach town of nha trang, and will head north tomorrow to hoi an. nha trang is not quite our cup of tea, so we don't feel much need to extend our stay. hoi an, on the other hand, has been at the top of our list, so we expect to settle in there for a bit longer. it's also where you can get any sort of clothes you could ever want custom made. so look for brendan in a three piece silk suit come january...

HCMC to Da Lat, with the sunburn to prove it

we have had a very eventful first few days in vietnam. we arrived in ho chi minh city after a long haul from seattle to seoul, and then a shorter - but no less painful - haul from seoul to ho chi minh city. we arrived at the riverside hotel to discover a room that bore little resemblance to what i had reserved online. there was peeling paint, a dirty bathroom, and construction in the lobby. but the fact that our beds -- we each had one that was a little bigger than a twin, but smaller than a full -- were adorned with tiger print bedspreads allowed me to see past its flaws. and it proved to be dead silent in a bustling city of 7 million, so it provided the space for the good night's sleep we so desperately needed.

we spent just one full day in ho chi minh, but managed to see quite a bit. we traipsed all around district one - which was where we stayed, and was also home to the backpacker district, a lovely park, as well as the pho spot that was graced with a visit by bill clinton a few years ago, and our motto is, "if it's OK with bill, it's OK with us" so of course we had to try it - until our legs were ready to fall off. we then pushed it a little further with a walk to the war remnants museum, which was as uplifting as it sounds. i had decided that i couldn't feel OK about visiting vietnam without some attention to the war, so this was at least a decent start. after our visit, we decided to bite the bullet and hop on a tourist-trap cyclo. this is essentially a three-wheeled bicycle that has a big seat for the passenger - or passengers, since in our case we squished into one together - and rides around in scooter/truck/car traffic as though it is a motorized vehicle itself. it was a novel experience, though a little more hair-raising than is my general preference.

it was also a good warm-up for the 7 hour bus ride into the central highlands which we did yesterday. GOOD LORD. i thought mexico city would have prepared me for this. it didn't. we were driving on two-lane roads for probably 3/4 of the entire drive. and let me tell you, a two lane road does not mean there are two lanes of traffic. brendan and i avoided looking out the front window of the bus, but we did catch the occaisional glimpse of three scooters on the right side of the road, another one or two on the left side of the opposite lane, a distantly oncoming bus, and a truck that our driver DECIDES TO PASS. all in two lanes. perhaps it is my american appreciation for order, but something just wasn't right with that picture. we somehow made it to da lat in one piece, with nothing more than a slightly bruised psyche. we were then dropped at our first choice hotel to find that it was full for the night, but were directed by the madame to her brother's hotel down the street to have a look at the room he had available. before i know it, brendan and i are being whisked away on the back of two mopeds, sans helmets. it was a 600 meter ride, and i never knew 600 meters could feel so long. i got the sense that my driver knew zero english, but i gave a clearly enunciated "SLOOOOOOOOW" into his left ear just the same. i then clung to his slim waist for the entirity of the 2 minute ride, which probably made him blush but i was doing a whole lot more than blushing so i couldn't have cared less.

we saw the room, and snatched it up for a bargain $15... much nicer than our dear riverside which ran us $50/night. we are just warming up to the haggling and haven't quite gotten our communication down yet. brendan was going to try to get it for $10 (he's no softie anymore!) but i volunteered a higher price. we settled in a bit and then went out to the town square to have dinner and a drink. we got ourselves a spot at a nice outdoor cafe overlooking da lat's own eiffel tower. it's known in vietnam as the "petit paris" but i am sorry to report that its eiffel tower is nothing more than an electrical tower with some christmas lights on it. it's the thought that counts, i suppose. anyway, we continued to play it safe with our diet, and i ordered the sauteed noodles with vegetables and brendan ordered the pork and cabbage soup. no sooner had brendan remarked on how you have to wonder about restaurants that have such a comprehensive menu than he was being served a dish identical to mine with some beef added on for good measure. maybe you don't actually have to wonder about those kinds of restaurants. they list the possibilities, which may or may not be the realities.

we ended our dinner with a nice chat with a local family out for ice cream sundaes at the table next to us. the dad was clearly a bit of a ham, and wanted his older daughter to practice her english with us. she was sufficiently embarrassed, and then it became clear that it was perhaps pops who wanted to show off his english chops. there was limited potential, but we swapped where we were from, etc. and then headed out on our way. we are certainly more of a novelty here than we were expecting...

today we set out to take a short train to our first pagoda. we were up at 6 (still figuring out the jet lag thing) so we made it to the train station for a 9am train that didn't actually exist, or was full -- we're still not sure. we bought tickets for the 2pm train, and found ourselves with 5 hours to kill since we had probably walked close to 4 miles to get to the train station. we strolled a bit more, and stumbled upon a bunch of school kids out at recess. we got the usual celebrity treatment, with one outgoing girl practically running us over with an enthusiastic "hey, good morning, hello!" we chatted with her for a minute with the entire playground (euphemism -- actually an open field) watching in admiration. with the end of the exchange, they all burst into cheers. pretty cute.

we finally made it out to the pagoda, which was incredible. i am considering converting to taoism just because i liked it so much. it had a certain willy wonka and the chocolate factory appeal. brendan and i scaled this huge tower to tempt my mild vertigo in the name of an incredible view of the rolling hills around da lat. we unfortunately didn't have much time because we had to catch the train back, but i took tons of photos to try to burn the whole scene in my memory. taoist nathalie. i think it has a certain cache.

back in da lat, we stopped for a coffee break -- this is the coffee growing region -- in a little spot recommended by our guidebook. as we sipped the milky and delicious concoction, we were amazed to see another of our countrymen -- not clinton this time -- gracing the wall. on one wall was some sort of religious shrine, and on the otherwise blank wall adjacent, a single headshot of bill gates. i tried to take a photo to share with the foundation folks, but in the process of getting out my camera the lens cap fell into a deep crevice next to where we were sitting, and the other customers immediately came to help us move the booth out from the wall to retrieve it, at which point i was too embarrassed to snap my photo of bill gates in the central highlands of vietnam. our last stop before coming back to the hotel was to book our little adventure that we have had in mind since leaving seattle thanks to a recommendation from my friend mary. we are biking tomorrow from the highlands down to the coast. it'll be about 70km, so i hope my bum cheeks are ready. we'll then be at the beach for an evening before heading further north.

a lovely trip so far, and we are looking forward to more. we've learned the painful lesson that you really can get sunburned when it's overcast, as da lat's cloudy skies and cool temperatures taught us today. and we are hanging in there with the communication, though it's taken us 3 days to learn how to say "thank you". we should have vietnamese fluency checked off of our list by the end of the trip, easy. actually, if i can get "hello" and "good-bye" down by next week, i will consider myself a linguistic prodigy. i had never really stopped to think about what a language with six different tonal inflections for each vowel means in reality. we can be as earnest as we'd like, but it sure ain't pretty.