Day 109 – 1st June: Supermarket Sweep Today we realised that we needed to replenish a few things so we went to have breakfast at the Mad Monkey Restaurant and the Backyard Café for Charlotte. Both very yummy establishments. We jumped in a tuk tuk to return towards our neck of the woods to find our nearest supermarket. Luckily this was only at the top of our road – I say only it was about a 20-minute walk or so (Amy). We arrived at lucky supermarket and were rather pleased with what we found. It is safe to say we browsed all the aisles whether we needed them or not. This was the first time since we left home that we have stepped into a decent supermarket with products that we could understand or were worth buying. We picked up a few essential and found a pharmacy too, this was very handy two birds, one stone and all that jazz. We walked back towards our hostel as it was rather hot in the beaming sun of 35 degrees. Quick change before heading to the pool next door which has proved to be rather handy on these hot days. We chilled by the pool for a couple of hours taking in the sunshine and shade whilst being splashed by inconsiderate people who resembled adults. It didn’t matter it was cooling, it was just annoying. We had a drink in our hostels roof top bar on happy hour, a group of child-like lads walked in and the whole bar questioned their age. We think they were asked to leave – not too sure – they drank rather quickly and left. I kid you not they can’t have been any older than 16! We went for dinner, found a restaurant we hadn’t tried before. It was nice, oversized portions but on the plus, side the bill was 25 and we only paid 15 as he gave us too much change back. Happy Days. Day 110 – 2nd June: Wat Phnom and re-packing Last full day in Phnom Penh and we had nearly run out of things to do. We had left two wats to the end so we could decide if we were all wat-ted out or not. We weren’t plus packing wasn’t going to take us the whole day as we never get anything out of our bags. We are practically living out of bags. We went back to the Backyard café – serves raw, vegan friendly and gluten free food – for breakfast. Jodi and Charlotte had pancakes, Amy had an acai bowl which is becoming very attached to. After that we grabbed a tuk tuk from outside and (there is a theme running here) he was odd. His English wasn’t great and he couldn’t understand our accents. We used a map to show him where we wanted to go. Our first stop was Wat Phnom, it wasn’t necessarily spectacular it was just different as it was on top of a hill in the middle of the city. It was a nice visit and it’s a working temple so people were praying which was nice to watch. We then found our tuk tuk guy and tried to explain that we wanted to go to another wat which we couldn’t pronounce. he only seemed to work off street numbers, well this didn’t have a street. He dropped us off nearby but not too close and obviously saw us keep walking, he drove alongside us until we stopped. He ahh’d and said he would wait here for us. This one was a little more attractive but still eerie. Charlotte stopped to take a picture of a building. The old man outside ushered us to come over and opened the doors. Little did anyone know what was about to happen. He ushered Jodi and Charlotte into the small area he just opened. Inside, was a statue on a Buddha. He sat them down and pointed out his eyebrow which confused us (Amy has read up that this stupa (in particular) contains the eyebrow hair of a Buddha). He then proceeded to light some incense sticks and hand it to each of them. They placed it in the sand and much to their surprise, got flicked with water. He then took their hands and put some water in them which they were to wipe over their faces. He did this while chanting. He then lit a candle and the girls made an offering to the Buddha by putting some riel into the pot in front of the statue, we thanked him and promptly left. We waited for our tuk tuk drivers he was nowhere to be seen. Kind of getting a bit annoyed by the offerings you get from tuk tuk drivers when you clearly and politely ay no thank you. Our driver randomly popped up in front of us and he took us back to the Top Banana. When we got back we packed, showered, got dressed, had a few drinks on our last happy hour in Cambodia and went for dinner. Day 111- 3rd June: Moving to Vietnam Travel time – taxi 20 mins, 6-hour coach, taxi 20 mins Firstly, I forgot to mention, it rained every evening in Cambodia for around 1 – 3 hours at the same time give or take an hour. It was very strange but helped us to plan our time better, knowing we did not want to get stuck in the horrendous down pour. It wasn’t just a little bit, it nearly floods the road in front of the hostel when it rains.
Today it was an early-ish start our coach was leaving at half 8 so we jumped in our last tuk tuk- happened to look like a purple bean- and headed to the pick-up point. This coach wasn’t as empty as the one to Phnom Penh. We settled in our seats and started the journey. We stopped around half way as per normal and reached the boarder of Cambodia and Vietnam which turned out to be a lengthy process. We left the Cambodian border, leaving the coach to have our passports looked at, walked to get back on the bus only to get off the bus moments later as we drove (we could have walked) to the Vietnam border. We had to take all our bags off the coach for them to be scanned. All this time may I add, we were without our passports as they retain them to makes things ‘easier’. Jodi thought of a much more easier way but hey ho, that’s not how they roll. We waited in the waiting area for our names to be called out and Amy and charlotte were first. This is when we got our passports back, our bags were scanned and we returned to the coach for the last leg of our journey, a few hours later than planned. We got dropped off in the middle of the street, searched for an atm and hailed a cab. Again, a div. of a cab driver who didn’t know where we wanted to go. He asked us several times where we wanted to be dropped off. He too dropped us in the middle of the highway on a central reservation. By this time, we just wanted to be inside and away from the rude and in your face people we had already encountered. That was only the first hurdle. We then attempted to get into the Apartment, Lotus’ Home. We had no Wi-Fi to contact the home owner so we waited for her to receive our message and she eventually came downstairs. We settled in dropped our stuff and it dawned on us how hungry we were. We attempted to find food and settled for a student meal of pasta, tuna and sweetcorn. We then chilled for the rest of the evening. Day 112 – 4th June: Attempt for a supermarket and Billy’s arrival We brought breakfast yesterday so munched that before attempting to find some sort of food and just explore the area, try to find out what was around us. Today 3 will become 4 at around 2:00pm. We headed out and walked straight into market stalls housing food, ladies in the traditional hats and a ridiculous number of bikes. We carried on walking attempting to find a supermarket, none of which represented a supermarket more like a convenience store. We picked up a few snacks and headed back to drop them off at apartment before leaving for the airport. We arrived, grabbed a coffee and waited for the flight to arrive. It was only a few minutes late and the announcer announced it had arrived, we moved towards the door so it was easier to spot. It is safe to say that we got so many looks today it was comical. Billy finally came through the doors and we were off to the apartment with a much more helpful taxi driver. Sadly, it was raining at this point, but we chilled and chatted for a little bit before going out to grab a bite to eat. The rain held off the time were we out … hooray. Day 113 – 5th June: Our own city tour We set out after breakfast to find some of the sights, Ho Chi Minh doesn’t have that many so we were limited in what to look at. We rushed into a coffee shop however as the heavens opened and it was very uncomfortable to be walking around in such heavy rain. Our tour guide, Miss Jodi Walden led us through the streets to our first spot. The town hall. A very regal building with a fancy clock tower. The was a statue of Ho Chi Minh here to so we hung around and took some pictures. The weather is a bit bipolar today. In front of us it was bright blue skies and when you turned around it was heavy and dark. We popped into MacDonald’s to again get out of the rain before moving onto the Cathedral aptly named the Notre Dame. slightly smaller than the original, but pretty nonetheless. opposite this was the post office which is a tourist attraction believe it or not. it was a very stunning structure inside, grand ceilings and old phone booths but still a working post office. We then ran out of places to go, we wandered over to the independence palace. It was closed so we took some pictures from the outside. It wasn’t until this point we had realised how far we had actually walked. We decided to walk back to our end which took longer than expected. We got back to the apartment and chilled before attempting to head out to a roof top bar. Unfortunately, lots of them were quite far from us so we looked a little closer to home. We found one close to us and walked there in the rain of course. We got up to the roof and took a
seat, it was still raining and we were getting wet so we moved to the bar. Once the rain ceased, we took some pictures. It was an electrical storm too which made our hair stand on end which was quite funny, shame we couldn’t picture it. We had a few more drinks, chatted and later made the move back to bed. Day 114- 6th June: bad weather day We had nothing planned for today and after our fun packed city tour yesterday we decided to have a lie in. Slowly we began to wake up, we headed into the kitchen for breakfast and sat down to catch up with our beloved holly oaks on the computer! After watching our two episodes we decided we should pack as we leave early in the morning. We slowly sorted our things and began to repack them into our rucksacks. After packing we showered and got dressed by this time it was lunch time and Amy was a little peckish. So, we cooked some pasta, we then decided to have a look around the shops. We headed into a taxi as it was pouring and he dropped us as the entrance of the vincom centre. Being a new shopping centre it was still only half open but we had a good look in the shops that were there. After a few hours, we headed out for a taxi home as we were going to the financial tower viewing deck tonight. After arriving home, we had a drink and began to get ourselves ready for the evening. Once everyone was ready we headed into another taxi as it was pouring with rain, once we arrived we looked around to find a sign showing us the entrance. We all got our tickets, avoided the man with the camera trying take a welcome photo and headed into the lift. We had a quick journey up to floor 49, we headed out of the lift to see the instantly spectacular views. We all walked around slowly taking lots of pictures and reading the information. Particularly paying interest in the design behind the building, it is apparently based on the famous lotus flower that everyone in Asia knows and loves. Me and charlotte didn’t agree but Amy thought so could see where the idea was coming through. Moving around we looked at the screens explaining what we could see in our view out of each window such as the motor way that went underneath to river to come out on the other side. None of us were very keen on the idea of driving under that though. Once everyone had got enough pictures we headed out to find food, we didn’t have to walk too far before stopping as a little restaurant. We all ordered and it was soon brought out, there were a few things wrong because of the language barrier but we rectified this and it was all ok in the end. After everyone was finished we grabbed the bill and slowly walked home. Popping into some shops along the way. When we arrived home, everyone was ready for an early night before our wake-up call, so we all got ready and headed off to bed. Day 115- 7th June: Move onto Mui Ne Travel time – taxi 15 minutes, 6-hour coach to hotel Up at 5.30 and it was already super light, which made the wake up that little bit easier. We quickly got ready and packed up the last bits into our bags. Leaving the keys to our little air bnb on the table we headed into the lift, we managed to jump straight into the taxi towards the Sihn tourist office (The bus company). We checked in and waited around amongst many other people, some doing the same journey and many others flitting off to do other tours. Finally, our journey was called out so we got ready and headed to the door, little did we know we then had to follow the guide quite far down the road to find the bus. Organisation and time keeping isn’t one of southeast Asia’s strong points, but you already know this. After putting our rucksacks in the hold and jumping on the bus, we all climbed up the ladders to our seats. A little strange being up so high on a coach but the view out the window was good! We all got comfortable as we began our journey, taking photos and talking about the crazy beeping and frantic driving. Mid conversation Amy realised our water bottle was leaking, as I grabbed it we realised the lid was half off. Major panic set in as we also then realised the water had leaked into the carrier bag. Amy had an idea of putting the carrier bag full of water into another bag but as I removed the bottle from the bag it began to leak. In a panic, we quickly put the bag inside another. By this time, it had already leaked all over the bed making a nice little river which began to run towards the edge of the bed and onto the man below much to his surprise. It’s safe to say to moved
fast. Anyway, we dried the bed just in time and we had stopped for a toilet break so Amy disposed of the water filled carrier bag on her way! Once everyone had begun to get back onto the bus we could smell a strong smell, we knew instantly what it was, someone was eating a durian. Making us all heave we all tried to think of ideas so that we could cover out noses from the smell. Putting tea tree oil under all our noses it began to smell better but the smell still lingered for a long time. The tiredness set in so we both had a little sleep in our comfy beds, surprisingly comfier than they look. Soon after this we stopped to let one person go to the toilet, we checked the map to see how long we had and realised we were only half an hour away. We only had to drop of one set of people before it was our turn. They mumbled something to us and when they stopped they said the name of our hotel, Mui Ne Hills. Once we had put on all our ruck sacks we followed the signs to our hotel and what a shock, the name was literal so we began walking up the hill. Reaching the top, we begin our check in process, a guy speaking very good English who we think may be from Belgium shows us around. He lets us know where everything is and showed us all the pools. We had half an hour to kill before we could get into our room so we had a quick drink. A lady then lets us know the rooms are ready so we head to reception, she shows us to our rooms and we dump all our stuff down. We all had quick showers and got dressed to go for a walk around. We walked down towards the shops and onto the beach, we wondered far down the beach and saw a big rain cloud. We then decided we should head back, walking back up onto the main road. Attempting to hurry back before the rain but we didn’t manage to get far before the heavens opened so we ran into a café quickly until it slowed down. We then headed back on our way, when we reached the hotel we all sat down for dinner. Being hungry we all ordered fast and within no time our food was in front of us. After we had eaten everyone started to lack in energy so we all decided to go back to the rooms and chill out so we were ready for our first full day tomorrow. Day 116 - 8th June: Pool Day Today we did exactly as the title suggests. We got up searched for breakfast, found a little place which did sandwiches. We munched and then headed back to the pool. Our place has two pools. One with umbrellas and one without. It wasn’t the sunniest of days so we opted for the umbrella-less pool. We relaxed, swam, watched people play volleyball, booked our tour for tomorrow, went out for dinner in a little Italian place, came back to the Mad monkey backpackers bar which is attached to our hotel, chatted, drank and went to bed. Exciting hey! Day 117 – 9th June: Sand Dunes and Fairy Streams The tour today was an afternoon tour so we arrived at our last destination for sunset. We waited at reception for someone to inform us of where we were going. They then told us to walk to the main road where the Mu Ni Hills bus would be waiting for us. We all piled on (29 of us) and 2 more people tried to get on but they had over booked the tour so the driver had to arrange different transport for them. We were on our way after that little debacle. It was cosy on the bus. Our first stop was the fairy streams. A stream which leads to a waterfall. Unfortunately, we only had 45 minutes here which took us up to the waterfall and back, cute little stream surrounded by sand banks of many different colours, locals and tree’s. We got back on the bus and headed to the next stop, the fisherman’s village. A little disappointing as it was just some locals selling fish on the beach – only 3 or 4 of them. The smell wasn’t very nice either so it was lucky we only had 10 minutes here. We then moved onto our furthest point which was the white sand dunes. We climbed the dunes and it was rather windy. We took some pictures watched the quad bikes and 4x4 fighting with the sand. It had an amazing view of a lake at the bottom. We made our way back down the sand and stopped for a drink and an ice cream. We were back on the bus and made our way back to the red dunes which we had passed earlier. Now … then plan was to watch the sunset here. However, this did not happen as we had to be back on the bus before the sun disappeared. They didn’t tell you the time you would get back from the tour. So, we were all a little bit miffed. It was beautiful nonetheless but we watched the sunset from the bus. We then came back for a well needed shower to get rid of the sand. And then went out for a very yummy Indian.
Day 118 – 10th June: Grey Day The day before moving day. We decided to top up then tans andddddd the grey clouds have descended on us. We went for an Indian last night which filled us up so we skipped breakfast and went out for lunch. We caught up on some bits like this diary and our favourite tv soap before packing our bags and heading out for lunch. We had an ice cream by the pool as the sun had reared its head. This lasted a matter of seconds before the heavens opened on us. We watched some people playing volleyball in the rain before heading out for dinner. Day 119 – 11th June: Moving to Nha Trang Travel time- bus transfer, 20 minutes, Coach – 6 hours Woke up to pristine blue skies and no clouds … what a lovely day to spend on a coach! We ate, got picked up at the end of the road at 12:30. We thought that we were going to be on this beat-up minibus for the rest of our journey. No one really had a clue what was happening. Anyway, we picked up more people, had a near crash when someone pulled out on us. The guy in front spilt his beer and the lady on the other side of Amy stood up with the force of the breaking. We pulled up at the coach office and our bus was pointed out to us. No more instructions were given. We waited half hour for someone to inform us that we could get on. We were in an orderly queue until these Asian women pushed in front of us and then everyone else felt they could do the same. This time we didn’t have seat numbers (big mistake made by the company) and it was chaos. People just sat down in spare seats, the bus isn’t big enough to swing a cat and people were trying to move around to sit next to people they knew. We were at the back in a trio and a single seat. The lady who was meant to be in charge had no idea what she was doing and tried to move people around. Chaos, it also didn’t help it was ridiculously hot at the back either. We were on the lower bunk this time, we prefer the top its less claustrophobic. We set off after a little commotion which we didn’t understand as it wasn’t in English. This time we had no stops it was a straight journey. We passed flooded roads and flooded fields. Drove through the torrential rain and sunny skies. We sweated and slept (well Amy did) and finally arrived at Nha Trang … petrol station. Yes, that’s right we were dropped off at a petrol station in the middle of a very busy intersection. Seriously, you couldn’t make this up. We tried to get a taxi from one side of the road, no one drove past they were all driving down the other side of the petrol station. So, we swapped sides and so did the traffic. Grrrrrr! We were very cautious of the scam taxis so we had reject the ones who didn’t look legitimate. We finally got one who dropped us at the hotel, Sunny hotel Nha Trang. We settled in, had a much-needed shower. Our room was upgraded to a family room – we weren’t sharing we just had an extra bed for relaxing in – and headed out for some much-needed food. We found a nice restaurant called Story which has a club, swimming pool and bar attached. Tonight, we also found out that Nha Trang is a Russian hot spot and everyone assumes you are in fact Russian. Day 120 – 12th June: Booking our next coach and pool We actually have breakfast included in the hotel so we were all super excited that we didn’t have to search for it. We must admit it isn’t the greatest but it is nice to just have things there ready for you. We googled the coach office and walked to book our coach for our 11-hour trip to Hoi An. We are on our own on this one as Billy and Charlotte have opted to get the train. We will mentally prepare ourselves for this journey. Luckily its overnight so hopefully we will sleep. On our way, back we stopped off for a drink in the Sailing Club, a posh beach bar (we didn’t know it was posh) with a view of the Vinpearl amusement park which is on a separate island. 2 lemon juices later and we were on our way back to the hotel for a swim on our roof top pool. We went up for a swim and saw a lovely dark heavy cloud over us. We did some swimming before the heavens opened. It was still really nice to swim in the rain. A little Russian girl joined us who became rather aggravating after a while. She would look at us and pick one of us to swim too, gradually getting more confident to the point of head-
butting us in the legs. She was also growling through her snorkel, saying things in Russian and swimming at us like an angry shark. There was a mass of thunder and lightning so we decide to head back inside. We did some more research about our next stops in Vietnam. Day 121 – 13th June: Beach Day We had a nice lie in as we all seemed to need it. We went and had breakfast with the chilli pineapple which featured on Amy’s snapchat. We decided to go to the beach as our hotel allows us to use the sunbeds for three hours free of charge. We picked up our towels and walked to the spot which had our hotels logo on it. The man in charged showed us to our sunbeds with the holey umbrella. There weren’t very many free as non-hotel guests can use them at a price. It was very hot and we were grateful for the shade. Jodi did some sunbathing and Amy caught the sun in the shade. After a while people watching, wind surfer spotting and chatting, we were a bit peckish. We picked the restaurant which was behind us called Louisane Brew House. It was a brewery with massive silo’s all holding the beers that they make. Amy had a passionfruit based beer which was amazing. We had a small snack and chilled there listening to the relaxing music and the owner talking about having a refurbishment. We took a few pictures and walked back to the hotel. We were very sweaty so decided to go for a swim. We went to the sister hotel, An Vista to use their pool. Theirs was on the 19th floor and promised a good view. We climbed a small flight upstairs following the music and there it was. It was so windy up there the pool had waves. We got in, had a good swim – it was challenging swimming with the waves which were being created – and watched the sun descend behind the hills/mountains. We weren’t particularly hungry so we went out a little later and got some pancakes. Caramel pancakes to be precise! They were amazing- so so good. We went to bed satisfied. Day 122 – 14th June: Our 11-hour journey We are on our own today, Charlotte and Billy got a morning train to Hoi An. We have opted for the sleeper bus which leaves at 7:00pm tonight. We laid in and took our time this morning as we were still full up from our pancakes. We checked out, asked if we could still use the beach (which we could) and headed over to the sunbeds. Our aim was to stay as sweat-free as possible and there is a good cool breeze down on the sea front. We got a bit peckish on the way here and ate them on the beach – little bit different to Brighton Pier! We chatted and chilled for the best part of the day before grabbing some snacks for the journey and a big dinner before we left. We got a cab to the tour office and were told to wait around for the bus after checking in. Luckily, we were up the top which pleased us both. We watched people joining the growing queue of people who were coming with us. Lots of people were looking at us while they were walking along the street trying to figure out what we were all waiting for. We then got a call to follow the lady to the bus. She took us back through the office which we found a bit weird and then ended up in a hotel. We walked out the door and there was the bus. We expected it to pull up in front of the office, not behind. Gave our bags to the man, got in our seats and settled down for the long journey ahead. We made our first toilet stop 2 hours into the journey which is when the lights turned off. We hit a wavy bit of road which felt like it took forever to pass but it wasn’t long at all. It made us feel a bit sick so we sat up. We were the only ones awake at this point. After the second toilet stop, we decided to sleep. Day 123 – 15th June: First Day in Hoi An We stopped again for our last toilet stop, rudely awakened by the bright lights being turned on. Amy watched the sun come up from the bus before taking another few minutes snooze. The bus came to a stop and the driver abruptly said, “Hoi An Hoi An off off”. We all scrambled around, half asleep, gathering our stuff together. We got off, collected our large bags and had countless offers of motorbike rides and hotels / homestays. Our hotel, Lilac Hotel, was a 3-minute walk away from where we were dropped off. We headed off and got a little confused as the map told us we were next to the hotel however it was further down the road. We walked in, dropped our bags, waited for someone to check us in, headed up to our room, dumped our stuff on the spare bed and promptly crashed out for another three hours. It was a good sleep on the bus
but not solid. We must have needed it as we both went out like a light. The alarm went off and we went to have breakfast, met back up with Charlotte and Billy and decided that we would explore Hoi An for today. It had reached 36 degrees by 10:00am so we knew it was going to be sweaty. We set off taking pictures, chatting and walking. Taking in some of the sights and walking by the river. We stopped off for a drink soon enough and cooled off in the air-con. We purchased some tickets for the old town as it is a heritage sight and walked around there too. We walked over the Japanese covered bridge, visited Minh Huong Communal house and Nguyen Tuong Family’s house. They were very interesting places and we learnt a little bit of history from it. We headed back to the hotel to jump in the outdoor pool which was very pleasant. After we had dinner we went out to look at the night market. It was only a small one but had lots of picture opportunities and lanterns. We slept very well that night! Day 124 – 16th June: Second day in Hoi An There is not much to do in Hoi An, it’s a picturesque little place but it does have a beach. We jumped in a taxi and headed towards An Bang Beach. It was a very warm day today; the white sand was burning and we were bombarded with offers of sunbeds and shade. Amy had found a beach bar on Instagram so we walked up the beach to have a look at that. It was cute and above the beach so had a nice view and a good amount of shade. We took pictures, had a drink and chatted before going for a walk along the other end of the beach. It is a very nice beach not too tourist based and enough space for everyone. We then popped to a camera shop as Charlotte needed to replace something from her Go pro and we walked back through the streets to the hotel from here. We looked in the shops, crossed the busy roads and said hello to the local children. We had another dip in the pool this evening as it was another hot day. Only today, there was something a little different about the pool. It was full of little white spider-looking things. On first look they looked like seeds or petals, however when we hooked some out onto the land they started to crawl around. Apparently, they are from the Bamboo tree’s they blow in the wind and end up in the pools. As far as we could tell they are harmless so we carried on swimming. We took a more relaxed approach to tonight, packed our bags ready for our move tomorrow and fell asleep. Day 125 – 17th June: Move to Hue For our move to Hue we had arranged a trip to take us there via the Hai Van Pass (as featured on top gear). We were picked up at 10:00am by a mini-van which was all for us. Our first stop was at a marble factory. They carve some amazing statues all out of marble and we could have watched them do it. From here we moved onto the Marble mountains. 5 mountains which represent the 5 elements: water, earth, fire, metal and air. We climbed to steps to the main one which is accessible to all tourists. Whilst up here, we saw some amazing views, pagoda’s, temples and caves. It was lovely and cool in the caves. We wandered back down the 275 steps all carved out of the mountain. We then made our way to the start of the Hai Van pass. A very twisty road which we videoed on the go pro. We took some pictures from the window and pulled up at the top of the pass at the Hai Van gate. This is where they have war bunkers and gun turrets which you can explore. It was a good laugh climbing to get the ultimate pictures. We then moved onto a beach called Lang Co Beach. It’s very pretty place which has been protected by the government. We then moved onto elephant springs. This is where we felt like the tourist attraction. It’s a natural waterfall / spring which forms a graduation down a series of rocks creating pools that you can swim in. It was full of bobbing orange life jackets and locals. We walked up a series of hills to find somewhere that was a little less crowded. Some people wanted to stop and talk to us and take pictures of us which we found a bit strange so we made our excuses and left. The last stop was the drop off at the hotel, Hue Villa Gardens. We checked in and relaxed, waited for Billy and Charlotte to arrive, headed out for dinner and drinks and came back to sleep.
Day 126 – 18th June: Abandoned Waterpark Waking up pretty hungry this morning we quickly chucked on some clothes and went downstairs to grab something to eat. We both opted for pancakes, with banana and pineapple, I had chocolate sauce and Amy had honey! Once finished we went back upstairs to properly get ready for the day, we had decided to go to the abandoned water park today. We’ve been really excited to visit here ever since we discovered it. We went to the top of the road and grabbed a taxi, after getting across where we wanted to go we were on our way. We drove for a long way on main roads to then arrive at some sort of entrance gate, a man lifted the pole to let us drive through. Down a long road through fields we finally arrive, we hop out and arrange that our driver will come back and get us. We set of towards the park, before crossing the water into the main park we found a little car to take pictures with. We then all did our pictures at the bridge and we then set of to explore. We went up to the top of the dragon up many winding staircases to find ourselves in the mouth of the dragon! Down stairs we an abandoned zoo/aquarium, lots of glass as the enclosures and tanks had been smashed. There were some funky animal statues to take pictures with, we then walked around the outside following the lake. We crossed the final bridge to get to the other side as we wanted to find the slides, we had to pass lots of cows on the path before we reached the slides. We climbed up the stair case and took many pictures on the different slides. Once everyone had got their shot we climbed down the helter-skelter looking slide. A little bit creaky and slippery on the way down but we finally made it to the bottom. We then all posed again on the bottom of the slides, obviously because we hadn’t got enough pictures. We then headed towards the path again, we saw what we though could have been a lazy river and then we arrived at the old amphitheatre. It looked as if they used to do water shows here, We explored around a little taking some photos before heading back to the entrance. We hopped back into our taxi and shortly arrived back at our hotel. We all headed to our rooms and done a few bits we needed to do before deciding to get ready and head out. We walked all along the river which was apparently the walking street. We passed many little shops and food stalls selling all sorts of different foods. Once we reached the end we walked towards the road as there were a few light up statues everyone wanted to see. We then headed on search of food, we found a restaurant called gecko. It looked so busy that we couldn’t pass up eating there so we quickly went in and tried to get a table, luckily, they had one. We all decided what we wanted and once the order came everyone was pleased with what they received. We then headed to find some chocolate at the shop as everyone fancied something sweet. Once we had done this we headed back and chilled before bed. Day 127 – 19th June: Pool Day We woke up and chilled in bed this morning, feeling quite lazy we slowly got ready and went to eat. After a good breakfast and a drink, we decided to just chill out today. We got ready and went for a little walk around the area seeing the different shops and restaurants. We headed back and spent the day in the pool doing lots of swimming and pool workouts! Whilst watching a man do some rather odd swimming and mucking around with his little boy. Then we had the pool to ourselves for a while before anyone else turned up. After many hours swimming we decided to get out, shower and have some lunch. I had the famous chicken noodles that I love! We then headed up stairs to... write the diary, sort photos, pack and chill out before heading out of dinner in the evening. Day 128 – 20th June: Our Move to Dong Hoi After a rough night, we are now moving onto Dong Hoi today via train! This was an unplanned part of Vietnam as we had a recommendation to go and see their national park. We googled it, decided it was worth it even though this is new to the tourist scene and booked our accommodation and here we are. We caught a taxi to Ga Hue (train station) and waited in the waiting room with all the other Vietnamese families waiting for the train. The children are intrigued by us, the families want to introduce their children to us and well we just wanted the train to arrive. We had second class soft seats so we made our way down the
platform to coach 3. We boarded the train via the huge step which was rather comical as Amy struggled to get up them with the massive backpack we call ‘our life’ attached to her. We settled in our seats and it was safe to say it was not what we were expecting. Empty bottles on the table, a lady carrying a stinky bin bag sat opposite us, and bags of potatoes/onions placed around the carriage. We settled down in our seats (we moved seats in the end because of the smelly bin bag) opposite Charlotte and Billy as the train began to move. This journey was only 3 hours long – relief! We pulled up into Ga Dong Hoi and jumped into a cab to take us to our hotel, Geminai. Day 129 – 21st June: Not much to see here We decided to go for a walk to the beach today. We were advised not to go to the backpackers’ beach to the left of us as it’s a bit grubby (closer) and dirty. So, we turned right and headed towards a rather large bridge which would take us to the other side of the river. There were a few little things to see on the way and it was nice to not be bombarded by traffic. We reached the foot of the bridge and underestimated how large it actually was. There was a good breeze over the top so we marched on up and over. The other side was empty, like a ghost town. We continued straight towards the beach. The sun was beaming down on us now and the breeze disappeared. We arrived at the beach – which was also empty – and did an abrupt U-turn. We took some photos obviously but we were in desperate need of a drink. There was nothing insight, places look like they had been left and the ones that were opened, looked like they didn’t want our custom. We headed back over the bridge and popped into the Buffalo hostel. We spent a little bit of time here, attempting to cool off, drying out sweat patches and so forth. We then grabbed a lolly on the way back from a small place called ‘Lick N Bite’. Headed back for a well-deserved shower before heading out again for diner. On the way to dinner we were accosted by a lady who asked if it would be okay for her class to practice their English with us. They were all super excited and ran over to say hi, they asked us where we were from, our names and other questions. They also sang a Vietnamese song to us which was really sweet. One child saw our phones and shouted Selfie! We then had a few photos taken and we all said goodbye. We then had dinner and had an early night as we got to be up early for our cave trip tomorrow. Day 130 – 22nd June: Our Cave trip and move to Hanoi Travel time – taxi 15 minutes, train 11 hours We were up at 7:00am to go down for breakfast. The lady who served us said they had no bread so we couldn’t have toast. We had seen people with baguettes and tried to explain to her that a baguette is still bread so could we have that instead, this took around 15 minutes to explain. Anyway, we got our breakfast and brought our stuff downstairs, we had to check out now as we leave this evening. Our minibus picked us up and our tour guide Pink informed us of our itinerary. We picked up some more people along the way and made our way to the first cave, Paradise Cave. We walked up a long hill which wound its way up to the entrance of the cave. In the heat, this was very difficult and we were looking forward to getting in the cool cave. We went down the stairs into the cave which was very pleasant, we were soon surrounded by stalactites and stalagmites being lit up by lights highlighting them. We walked the 1km into the end of the cave where experts can go further with permission from the national park. We walked back avoiding the mass of tour groups and descended down the 572 stairs to the base of the cave. We got back on the bus to go get some lunch, traditional Vietnamese style. After this we got a traditional boat to the water cave. It was a pleasant half hour sail to the entrance of the cave. It was dark and cool in this one too, we paddle through and back out to a stretch of beach where we got out and walked our way through to the other side. It was a very pleasant trip. We arrived back at the hotel and had a few
hours to kill, we had a drink, ate and grabbed some snacks for our train journey. We caught a cab to the train station, not long after the train pulled up. We climbed on board, settled into our cabin- 4 beds a bit like harry potter- and relaxed before falling asleep. We are on here for 11 hours may I add. Day 131 – 23rd June: Arriving in Ha Noi We pulled into Ha Noi station at around half 8. Headed straight into the street and decided to walk as we weren’t sure which taxis were scam taxis and which ones were genuine. This kind of turned out to be a mistake. We walked for around half an hour before we arrived at the Gecko hotel. We had booked the hotel for an extra night so we could check in early as we checked out early from Dong Hoi. This caused confusion for the lady checking us in as she wasn’t going to be willing to give us the room as we were ‘late’. we kicked up a bit of a fuss and she let us in. We had a good shower and then headed out to attempt to get breakfast. This proved very difficult and we ended up having lunch. Ha Noi is manic. So many cars and mopeds driving in all the wrong directions, the heat, the smells, the rude people and tourists. It was just so busy. We came back to relax before heading out for dinner, we got dominoes as we needed so familiar food after the struggles of previous areas. We were knackered from the train journey as it wasn’t that easy to sleep. We watched a film and had an early-ish night. Day 132 – 24th June: Getting ready for Bali So, this morning we spent a few hours planning our accommodation for Bali and researching the best areas to stay. We did this downstairs in the hotel as the Wi-Fi was naff in our room. After a while and square eyes later we went out for a walk and to get some snacks, it was too hot to be wandering around Hanoi so we grabbed a frozen drink and went back to the hotel to pack. When it had cooled down (even if it wasn’t that much) we went for a walk to explore the parts we hadn’t explored yesterday. Part of the road gets closed off at certain point during the day. We walked around the lake, as did half of Hanoi too. We broke away from the crowds and headed back towards the main roads, we wandered past the opera house and the Indonesian embassy. There was much to see so we headed back in the direction of the lake. We continued our walk round and stumbled on small groups of people providing toys or games for children to engage in. There were maths puzzles, double-Dutch skipping, a traditional Vietnamese game and stilts made out of bamboo. There was big sense of community here and it was lovely to hear the children laughing. We reached our starting point and headed to dinner. Day 134 – 25th June: We’re leaving Vietnam Travel time – taxi 25 minutes, total flight time 8 hours, taxi 30 minutes. We are leaving Vietnam today! We got up had breakfast and this is where the bad luck started. We paid for our rooms and asked the receptionist to call us a taxi. What felt like hundreds of taxis drove passed us and when ours turned up it was tiny. We needed a big one so we asked her again. It then took her 15 minutes to tell us there was no big ones. We caught one driving past a few minutes later and bid our farewells. We arrived at the airport paid the taxi driver which turned out to be very cheap for the distance we just covered. We headed to the check in desk where we encountered our next problem. The entrance stamps we got in our passports when we crossed the Cambodia – Vietnam boarder had the wrong date written on it. Apparently, his happens all the time so we went to the immigration desk to get it changed – they were un-phased. We then queued back up and were checked in by someone who appeared to be half asleep. We cleared immigration and security checks and made our way to the gate for our first flight. We had a quick facetime chat with Mollie, Macie and Riley as well as mum and dad before boarding the plane. This was smooth, the plane was half empty and we could spread out a little bit. We chatted our way through the flight and arrived at Kuala Lumpur airport. We thought we would be here for 3 hours … we ended up having less than an hour. We
caught a mini-train to our gate and grabbed some food as the plane meal wasn’t the greatest choice. We boarded our next flight which was a little busier and the meal was better so we were all good. We arrived in Bali where Amy’s bag took forever to come of the luggage carousel We made our way to the taxi desk and grabbed a taxi, sat in traffic for a while and arrived at our hotel, Destiny Boutique Hotel, around half 10. Checked in, showered and crashed looking forward to our first full day in Bali. Day 135 – 26th June: First day in Bali Our first full day in Bali and we are going to do what we always do – explore. We discovered we were 20 minutes or so from the beach so that’s where we headed first. This tide was very high so we walked as far as we could before heading up a path. We arrived at a random road which we followed and took us to the main roads of Seminyak. There was a flea market we looked in, some shops, several restaurants and more shops. This appeared to be where everything was. We stopped off to grab a drink before heading towards the vast array of shops and eateries before us. We came across a small shopping centre which we looked in. All very expensive as you can imagine. We took a few pictures before moving on. We spotted somewhere for dinner, Café Bali and continued to make our way around the winding roads. We soon found ourselves back at our starting point and headed back in the direction of the hotel. It was very warm so we jumped straight in the shower and began looking for our next set of hotels. Soon enough we had a grumble in our tummies and headed back to the restaurant we spotted earlier. It was a very good find indeed, and we actually had enough room for a pudding each! Day 136 – 27th June: Second day in Bali (Charlotte’s birthday) Yesterday we had originally wanted to go to Seminyak beach yesterday so we decided we were going to do that today instead. We chilled by the pool for a couple of hours before heading out. The pool unfortunately was freezing cold as it doesn’t get much sun so we dipped our toes. We headed back down the beach and walked further than we did yesterday eventually arriving at a beach club which we had our eye on before. We did a U-turn and headed back in the direction we had come from. We turned off down a side road and ended up on the high-street! We grabbed another drink and a bite to eat before heading back towards the hotel, the walk in general took us about 3-4 hours. When we got back we arrange to meet Charlotte and Billy- obviously it wasn’t very straight forward- showered, got dressed and headed out. For once, we were the ones who were late as we had to search for an atm. We went to a pizza place which had gluten free pizza and 2-4-1 ciders and pizzas. We munched and moved on to a Moet champagne bar, shame we had just missed jukebox bingo but it was fun to listen to the oldies playing. There were a couple of celebrations which required Moet bottles with sparklers attached, Jodi was very jealous. We then moved on another bar which was playing live music. The guy had a really good voice, the cocktails were … experimental. We chatted for a while until the music stopped, finished up our cocktails and said our goodbyes. We probably weren’t going to see each other until we were home which felt very strange. We embarked on our long, dimly lit (extremely safe) walk back to the hotel.
Day 138 – 28th June: Foodie day today
Jodi has scoped out a few restaurants which are both delicious and Instagram worthy. Anyone looking to visit Seminyak, be prepared to eat. There are so many eateries, dessert places, cafes and gelato shops you will be spoilt for choice. We had alight breakfast as we knew we were eating lunch and dinner today. We chilled for a little bit then headed out to Sea Circus. As you can see from the pictures we were very pleased with what we had. Amy had an ice-cream cookie sandwich and Jodi has churros with a berry blended frappe each. We took some photo’s (including in the bathroom not featured here) and took a slow walk back towards the hotel. Yes, we do spend a lot of time walking back and forth from the hotel, but it is so warm you need about 3 showers a day to stay smelling nice! After our 2nd shower of the day we headed back out to La Plancha beach bar for the sunset. We were unable to grab a bean bag as they were all full, so we headed upstairs to the upper balcony which we had to ourselves for a while. As the sun started to set, it filled up more both downstairs and up. We got some awesome pictures and once the sun had fully disappeared, we were on our way to dinner. We picked Motel Mexicola (the bottom to pictures next to Amy in the sun), a Mexican restaurant with funky interior and the best quesadilla’s ever! It was safe to say that today, we were well and truly stuffed. Day 139 – 29th June: An unexpected walk into Kuta Today we were meant to go to the potato head beach club but … we slept in, whoops! So instead we went for a walk the other down the beach. In the four days, we have been in Seminyak we have done over 80,000 steps, we have very sleepy legs. Anyway, we walked and walked which didn’t feel as long and realised we had walked into Kuta. There was a shopping centre here that Jodi wanted to visit so we veered off the beach and headed in there. We were confronted with New Look, Topshop, H & M and Bershka. We are currently struggling with our clothes as things have got too big, discoloured or we are bored of. We thought this may help as they also had sales. It failed but we were satisfied that we had tried. We grabbed a drink and walked back down the beach, topped up our tans and watched the massive waves crash over the pro-surfers and beginner surfers not envying them at all. We were pretty knackered after this walk so when we returned we decided to grab something quick and easy but yummy. We went to Wacko burger which has the most amazing sauce in their burgers and yummy milkshakes with sprinkles on top. This satisfied us very very much and we (eventually) went to sleep happy Day 140 – 30th June: We are on the move to Ubud Travel Time: Taxi – 1hr 20 mins. We had a rough night sleep last night, a 6:00am knock on the door was not what we needed. Still unsure of why this happened as neither of us answered it. But today was moving day. We got up, had breakfast, packed and checked out. We hired a private taxi to transfer us to Ubud as it would be the cheaper option rather than a meter. We left Seminyak at 12:00 and arrived in Ubud at 1:20pm. What was meant to be a short journey, half an hour I think, turned into the 1 hour 20-minute journey There is so much traffic it is unreal. We waited to check in until 2, were welcomed at Pertiwi Bisma 2 with a pink juice which was rather sweet and were shown to our room. This is a peaceful yoga resort (we were unaware of this) with an amazing infinity pool. We dumped our stuff and went to the onsite restaurant as we weren’t that hungry this morning after our burgers last night so only had a light breakfast. We then tried to organise our days here as there is so much to do! We went for a walk before sunset to find out what was here and discovered we are very close to things like restaurants, markets and shops. When we got back, we both had baths … the first bath since Fiji! It was a very welcome luxury, our room in fact is a very welcome luxury.