Nha Trang (Day 4)

I learnt a very good lesson on my morning walk today. Never leave home (or your hotel) without enough money to get a taxi home. Actually, that was advice my beautiful mother gave to me when I was a teenager as well. I should have listened Mum.

This image is all I could get to help me find out where I was this morning, and I was really wishing I had access to Mick’s Maps, but he was still in bed.

Once I left our hotel, I decided I’d walk down a different street on my way to the beach.

At first, there were so many interesting things to see and I was having such an enjoyable time. I discovered a street-side market less than 300m from where we are staying, hidden in back streets.

Another example of how congested the footpaths get.

Many of the street stalls were being set up in front of people’s homes, but there was also a conglomeration of small shops on different corners forming a more formal market area.

Check out the patchwork cement repairs that have occurred here.

This woman was sweeping the footpath in front of her shop before she set up her wares to sell for the morning. It is impressive to me that she even tries to keep it clean and tidy when there is so much more that needs to be done.

The streets I was walking down became smaller and smaller. This definitely was not a tourist area. At this point I stopped taking photos and started to get a little nervous. I was walking past people’s homes as they were having breakfast, and I really had no idea where I was.

There are quite a few dogs in Vietnam, and yes some do get eaten (we heard that from our son’s Vietnamese friend and we saw a dog being butchered on the side of a road a few days ago as we left Dalat). I love dogs, but am wary around dogs I do not know. During this part of my walk there were quite a few dogs roaming freely and I was barked at aggressively by one large black one. It really frightened me. A young girl walked past me about that time and I indicated to her I was worried by the dog so she yelled something at it, which gratefully gave me the chance to get the hell out of there.

I realised I needed to find a main road – so I headed towards traffic noise.

Just starting to get busy with peak hour traffic

After I had walked about 4km, I came up with an idea I was sure would get me home – as Google Maps was no use to me.

I decided I needed to head towards the sun, i.e. eastwards.

Now I felt confident I could get home safely. I had also come up with a Plan B if this did not work. I would walk into the first hotel I passed and ask to use their WIFI. As it turned out, I was now in a commercial area and I never found a hotel.

As my confidence grew, I was able to take a few more photos of interesting things I passed, but crossing the roads with these huge roundabouts was pretty scary this morning.

I passed another sidewalk business. Just as in many cities, businesses selling similar things can be found near each other, like furniture stores and car retailers, so it is true in Vietnam. Often the street stalls that are side by side are selling exactly the same green vegetables or fruit.

And like the row of barbers we had spotted yesterday, here was a row of women doing sewing repairs.

Eventually my idea to head east worked. I caught a glimpse of the ocean front about 400m from the road I knew well. I was happy.

Once back at our hotel I looked at my phone to see where I had been. I did not walk my normal 6km, but once I got a whiff of where I had to go – I was not deviating.

The red pin is our hotel.

Mick was impressed that I had used some nous to get myself back home once I told him my story.

And that was only 7am.

This post will be a long one – as there was so much more to our day.

Mick’s ‘take’ on my early morning adventure!!

One interesting, and disturbing thing we have noticed during our stay in Nha Trang is the strong influence from Russia.

Up until this part of our trip there has been little time to watch any TV, but now we are on our own and setting our own pace, we have watched some news – CNN News with its mostly Australian newsreaders is ok, but on another channel there is “Russia Today” (RT). This channel promotes Russia as only doing what has to be done to defend itself.

Our son’s friend, who used to work as a tour guide, has told us that Nha Trang is a favourite destination for Russians. There are flights between Nha Trang and Russia, mostly via Dubai.

Many of the shop signs are written in English and Russian, as well as Vietnamese of course.

Yes, Mick was considering buying some new shoes, as the super glue repair on his shoe did not last too long. I had used Google Translate to find out how to write “glue for shoes”, and not too far from here we came across a small store that sold some hardware-type products. I showed the shop owner the screen shot and he tried to sell Mick some more super glue. When Mick shook his head, he then handed him a small tin of glue (for 25,000VND / $1.67AUD), which Mick optimistically bought.

Once back at our hotel, to open the can of glue, Mick used our only sharp implement – a bottle opener we bought in Dalat, as travelling with hand luggage meant his pocket knife was not allowed on this trip. Anyway, the bottle opener did the trick. As soon as he got a whiff of the contents of the tin, he knew he was onto the right stuff. He had to use a complimentary tooth brush to paint the glue onto his shoe.

He took care not to get the glue onto anything else.

Now we must wait and see if this lasts any longer than a few hours.

During the afternoon we caught a taxi to the Louisiane Brewhouse – we had done enough steps for the day. It cost the equivalent of $3.50. Ridiculous.

The brewhouse is set on the beach front, and interesting to us there seem to be no flies or flying insects. While there was no IPA beer for Mick to taste, he did try the Louisiane Red (28 IBU) and their Dark Lager (23 IBU). The beers cost 105,000VND each (or $7AUD). The beers are made using malt from Australia and hops from New Zealand.

We successfully caught a taxi back to our hotel by hailing one on the main road. It actually was a long golf cart.

Mick doing his Lleyton Hewitt impression – Come On!!

An update on the bike riders – who today travelled 240km. An exhausting day.

Their photos show that they visited a tea, coffee and rubber plantations, a chicken and egg farm (yes, there is a joke there somewhere), and a war memorial.

Most of the trip was on busier roads so some skill was required to navigate the traffic.

They even used the hammocks provided at a road side stop to take a break. Unsure if I would have liked to use this toilet – with a view. Who gets the view? As there appears to be no door.