4-5 hours east from Ho Chi Minh City we arrived at the coastal resort of Mui Ne. Another popular place for stern looking Russian holidaymakers!

We were only making a brief one night stop in Mui Ne to see the local sights. We hired a moped for the duration of our stay, from our very nice and very reasonably priced guesthouse called 'Diem Liem'. It was set just back from the beach and just in front of sand dunes. A very peaceful and tranquil location, with a well kept garden area that the rooms faced out to.
First we went north in search of the 'White Sand Dunes', which were 35km away. On the way we stopped at the nearby fishing village, where there were hundreds, if not thousands of colourful fishing boats ranging in size, from the small basket shaped boats (Amelia thinks they look like oversized coconut shells), to the big trawlers. Along the beach, at the southern end, were dozens of women sorting clams, the sand on the beach is now substituted with millions of littered shells!
About halfway between the fishing village and white sand dunes is the 'Red Canyon'. A red dirt ditch, with a lot of Russian words/names scored into the sides.
The last 10km to the sand dunes was half dirt road, half sand road, which as you imagine is quite difficult to ride on! Although you wouldn't think it watching the locals using it. Unfortunately we weren't allowed to take the little moped up the dunes, so we had to go on foot. Half way to the top a local man with a few handmade sledges (just black plastic/rubber mats with a thin blue rope for reins). He also had a sandboard! After some serious bargaining we got him down to 30,000 dong (£1) to hire for as long as we wanted. But after about 5-10 minutes we were done! We were both so excited, neither of us have done it before, so we eagerly ran up the dune searching for the perfect, not too steep, part to try it out, but we were soon disappointed! Compared with snowboarding you're traveling at a snail's pace. I don't know if it was just the board, but we had to find an almost vertical section to get any sort of speed. After a few goes each we were done, it was very hard work climbing back to the top with the sun baring down on you, and the sand blowing in your mouth! Not a sport we can see ourselves getting into.
We stayed on the sand dunes until sunset, which was fantastic. On our way back the wind had picked up which meant having to ride pretty slow, dodging the big patches of sand which had been blown onto the road! After a dinner at a local restaurant, full of grumpy Russians, we went back to the hotel for a couple of fruit shakes. I asked for coconut, and before I knew it the barman was climbing the closest palm tree, in the pitch black, with only his wife shining a dimly lit torch towards the coconuts! You can't get much fresher than that!

5:30am we reluctantly got up to see sunrise at the 'Red Sand Dunes', which we only just caught! We naively thought we could just get up and go at this time of the morning, not realising the gates to the guesthouse would be locked, we had to 'accidentally' wake the owner by giving a few loud coughs so she could unlock them. We felt a little bad, but generally the locals get up at the crack of dawn anyway.
After a bit of an anti-climatic sunrise we grabbed a coffee, and went to the market near the fishing village, for breakfast with the locals. I had noodle soup, Amelia had a Banh Mi - bread roll normally with pork, egg, and salad. Afterwards we headed to the 'Fairy Stream', which is a little river, roughly 800m long, that winds its way through bamboo forests, boulders, and behind a small village producing fish sauce. Fish sauce, produced in big jars, harbour the concoction that, after months in the blazing sun, is sold all over Vietnam to add flavour to food. As you can imagine it has a strong pungent smell, and a taste not for the weak pallet!

After a short walk down the river which is no deeper than knee high, we went back to the hotel to catch our bus to Da Lat....