Epic Vietnam Journey (Day 4-Nha Trang)

Before I talk about my trip from Da Lat to Nha Trang, I forgot to mention one other difference between Hanoi and Saigon.  To put it bluntly, prostitution in Hanoi is more underground than in Saigon.  You will only find prostitutes in Karoke Bars and night clubs, where it is more subtle.  In Saigon, you can be walking down the street, and you will get propositioned.  I got propositioned twice within 100 feet.  The first prostitute asked me if I wanted a massage.  This is not out of the ordinary because there are a lot of legitimate massage places in Vietnam, and they are always outside handing out fliers.  I’ve been to a couple of them, and you can get a 2-hour massage for less than 10 bucks.  I don’t need a happy ending to be happy about that.  The massages are not that great, but even if they do that chop suey and slapping nonsense, it is still worth it.  So back to the prostitute.  She continues and says that she has a hotel room.  I’m thinking wow, this chick is a real professional and takes her work seriously.  Then it dawns on me that this may not be your ordinary massage.  So just to make sure, I politely ask her what service is she offering.  Then, she says something like sucky fucky and does some gesturing, and then I say ohhhhh I see.  I had to turn down her offer, and I felt really bad, because she seemed like a really nice person.  The second prostitute took a more straight forward approach, and asked me if I wanted to make love to her.  I’m thinking, love? Really?  I don’t think there would be much love associated with the acts that she planned on doing to me.  So, I politely turn down her offer.

Ok.  Back to Nha Trang.  I wake up kind of early (like 8am) and mapquest my trip to Nha Trang.  It reads like some crazy laundry list, because the names change so much.  You have to take a thousand different roads to get from one place to another around here.  I get lost a little bit in the city, but amazingly I somehow find my way out and onto the main road to Nha Trang.  

It is nice and cool, and actually feels a bit chilly on the way down the mountain.  It is beautiful scenery, complete with forests and many waterfalls.  Part way down, I notice that there are not many gas stations (like none at all), and I have about a quarter tank of gas, so I get a bit concerned.  The thing with my motorcycle is that the gas gauge reads more than full until there is quarter tank, and then once the gauge starts moving, it moves rather quickly.  So, I don’t really know how much gas is in the tank until it's more empty than full.  I notice my gas gauge dropping quickly.  Luckily, it was almost all down hill, and I probably went 100 km on a quarter tank.  There is no way I would have made it if it was uphill, or even if it was flat.  By the time I reached the bottom, there was a gas station, so I filled up and stripped off my jacket, as it was steaming hot.  

Mapquest was way off, because I was supposed to look for a fork in the road 30 km back, and now I come to a fork in the road, which has no route numbers and says nothing about Nha Trang.  I guess that this must be the fork, so I take I turn left into this small village.  I’m thinking I’m going to come across the scene in Apocalypse where they cut the cow in half with a machete.  I ask the locals directions to Nha Trang, which basically entails me repeating “Nha Trang” over and over again and pointing to various directions with my finger.  I get on the correct road, which resembles more of a bike path than an actual road.  But it is a nice country road with trees on both sides and lakes.  Nice scenery. 

I’ve been having a lot of problems with my so-called helmet, because the strap keeps loosening up, so when I hit a certain speed, the helmet slips back over my head to the back of my neck.  I finally had enough, so I give the strap a good yank, and besides choking myself half to death, the snap breaks.  I felt like chucking the helmet away, but I strapped it to the motorcycle as evidence in case I got pulled over.  I could just say that it broke on my trip and I was going to buy another one in Nha Trang.  

So, I’m riding down the road with sunglasses and no helmet and eventually get to Nha Trang.  There I was amongst a bunch of Vietnamese driving motorcycles with their helmets, and here is this white dude driving down the road with no helmet.  I envisioned that I must have looked like the Terminator riding into town with his sunglasses and hair blowing in the wind (yes, I was wearing the Terminator-type glasses).  Except I wasn’t on a Harley, but rather a small 100cc motorcycle, so I don’t think it had the same effect as the scene from Terminator.  But a man can dream.  Anyway, I was getting a lot of unneeded attention.

So, I get to the strip where all the hotels are, and Eureka, I see the beach, and it is a beautiful.  Miles of nice clean white sand with hardly any people.  

I decide to splurge on a Novatel Hotel, which is about 10 times as expensive as any other hotel that I’ve stayed at in Vietnam (hostels are about 5 bucks, and you can usually get a hotel room for 10 bucks).  But what the hell.  I figured I’ve been living in dorms and hostels that last couple months, so I deserve it.  I get to my room on the 9^th floor, and it has a balcony and complete view of the ocean.  Breathtaking view.  

And it has a shower that is actually separate from the toilet area.  

Almost all showers in Vietnam part of the bathroom area, so the whole bathroom gets wet including the toilet paper.  The only thing that I did not like about the hotel, which actually is not a problem if it is just you in the room, is that the toilet was on total display for all to see.  Basically, there was a glass partition between the toilet and the living area.  Kind of odd. 

So, I take a shower, and afterwards, I notice in the mirror that I’ve actually lost a bunch of weight around my belly, which is good, because I’ve been wanting to get rid of that nagging 5lbs of fat.  It is now mostly skin.  So, when I get back, I will be much thinner and much blacker as I’m getting quite the tan from the motorcycle riding.  

I go eat, and then decide to walk the beach.  The water was probably a bit warmer than the water in Hawaii, but not as warm as the Caribbean.  It felt good just wading in the water.  I then head back to my hotel, fully intent on getting my computer and doing work on the beach.  However, I spot these Vietnamese guys setting up a volleyball net, so I stick around in case they had an odd number of players.  They did have an odd number, so I asked to join in.  There was the tallest Vietnamese guy that I have ever seen.  He was probably 6’3” or 6’4”.  I’ve seen some tall Chinese people, but most Vietnamese men are quite short—maybe from malnourishment.  This guy was plenty nourished, but I was still probably heavier than he was.  I was no volleyball superstar, but I think I represented the 30+ crowd fairly well.  I actually don’t play volleyball, but I faked it pretty well.  

After about an hour though, I started getting dizzy and actually blacking out.  Sure sign of dehydration.  I go buy a coke, but bad choice.  I get back into the game, and I start blacking out a bit again, and it is getting difficult to see the ball as I have tunnel vision.  But I fight through it for a couple more hours as I am having too much fun.  Finally, we finish.  I have no idea who won or even if they were keeping score.  I go buy some water, and down about a liter of it in a matter of a couple minutes.  I stumble across the street trying not to pass out and not being able to see cars and motorcycles coming, having faith that they will dodge me, and they did.  I go up to my hotel room and pass out for real.

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