Onto china beach, which is right in the middle of Vietnam and 10km south of Denang. We finally arrived at denang bus station after a 15hr journey at around 7am after what was definitely the most comfortable bus journey I had been on. We was instantly hassled by about five different taxi drivers all wanting to take us to our destination so decided on 200,000d with one of them. We had a room reserved at Hoa's Place which was recommended by the lonely planet guide book, only costing $7 a night. We were met by hoa, who spoke very good English and run the guesthouse with his wife Giao, at the guesthouse and was shown straight to our room, which was very basic and not the cleanest but had hot water so jumped straight in the shower to freshen up. We headed straight out at about 10am to the Marble Mountains..... Hindu and Buddhist sanctuaries, high up in these mountains with huge steps leading up to them, it was also potentially the hottest sun we've ever felt which didn't make climbing the steps any easier and felt like 100% humidity also. Unfortunately it was very very touristy around the temples, I think there was a few school trips visiting so lots of kids running around going crazy and not showing much respect so it ruined the experience for us slightly, we decided to head down mainly because it was even far too humid for us to be walking around in that heat. Around the streets below the mountain were a countless number of marble merchants selling very detailed sculptures, statues, ornaments, jewellery, tables and furniture so the mountains had a massive impact on the lives of the people who live there. It was still only early, around 1pm, so we decided as it was so hot we'll hit the beach which was about 100m from hoas place where we were staying, it was a 30km stretch of beach which went north and south of marble mountain, but sadly could swim in the sea due to the currant being so strong so we went for a short stroll and found a resort that we could use called ''Sandy Beach Resort''. We had to pay 100,000d to use the facilities but decided to have lunch there anyway so was no problem, it was beautiful resort with hardly anybody staying there so we basically had the pool and sun loungers to ourselves all day, it's just what we needed after a week of travelling, a nice lazy day in the sun, bliss!
We headed back to the room to get ready for dinner which Hoa and his wife treat all of there guests to at 7pm and costs just 70,000d (£2). We had about 30 minutes to burn so decided to sit outside the room and watch the geckos on the wall feed on the flys that get attracted to the light above, it problely doesn't sound it but its very entertaining. There was us and about 5 others staying so it was nice to share story's about our travels with other backpackers. The food was put out on the table and everybody was free to tuck in... there were noodles, rice, spring rolls, fried tofu, salad and vegetables, and a very suspicious looking meat which was very seasoned and spicy (maybe to hide the taste) I'm not to sure what it was but it got ....woofed down by everybody so there was no complaining ;). After our lovely dinner, washed down by a few ''beer larues'' and a chat with the other travellers, we headed up to our room! It was out first night staying in this pretty awful room so with our bellys full we drifted straight off to sleep, until Jeni was very rudely awoken by a very unwelcome guest, a cockroach, crawling around the bedside table, trying to get to some food left on the side, which then meant that I was woken up, and given the unfortunate task of trying to rid the insect of the room, which I failed miserably by completely losing where it went which meant we had to sleep in the same room as 3'' cockroach (see ''cockroach wars''blog) not a nice feeling at all. In the end we managed to drop off losing about 3stone in sweat but made it though to the next morning alive, phew!