Our Easyriding trip from Dalat to Saigon, via the Central Highlands with Hiep and Ba was truly cool! (And yes, sorry parents, we know motorbikes was terribly silly and irresponsible of us, but we didn't die, so all's ok!). Gemma was (not so quietly) smug about the fact that Ba had just bought a new bike the previous afternoon - but it wasn't for Graham to ride on - ha, ha, ha, ha! He had been saving for it for 8 years and it caused a great deal of admiration everywhere we went! Apparently, Gemma "deflowered his virgin bike" . . . which is an interesting concept?!!

We had an amazing 4 days and covered nearly 700km (numb bums and also found that it is possible to nod off on the back of a bike!!). We had two great guides/drivers - particularly Hiep who we found to be an incredibly intelligent, considerate and knowledgeable man. We learnt a great deal from him - and had a swift agricultural education along the way - for some reason we had never even considered where things like pepper corns, cashew nuts and coffee come from . . . Tesco's generally! From Ba . . . we learnt a great deal about the war and rice wine . . . !!

In addition to travelling through the most amazing scenery we visited flower farms, amazing waterfalls, farms that still work with elephants, coffee, tea and rubber plantations, M'Nong Villages, silk worm and brick making factories to name but a few. What was incredible, and something we really weren't expecting here, was that it really was totally off the tourist trail. For once, these "tourist attractions" really were working, functioning businesses and villages that we just happened to pass and until we got to the Cu Chi tunnels, no coach trips and tour groups. The places that we stopped at were just going about their lives in the way that they would have been regardless of us. Nobody was trying to sell anything and seemed really pleased to meet some foreigners and that we were showing an interest in what they were doing. Many insisted that we stopped and had tea with them before moving on. We even came across our first Vietnamese lady who really had never seen a Westerner in real life before - she wanted Gemma's white skin and the ladies at the brick making factory wanted her nose!

In one town where we spent the night walking around in the evening was one of the most bizarre experiences of our lives and reminded Graham of his Grandad talking about when his village saw their first black person walking through it. Everywhere we went literally everyone would either stop what they were doing and stare at us with their jaws on the floor or rush to get their friends attention and point to come look at us! We had a real audience of a whole family coming out to watch us have dinner at a roadside cafe. The only way I could imagine the same reactions at home would be if a Panda casually strolled down Stony high street!

We had a truly fabulous time every day. We learnt a lot and feel tremendously privileged to have seen some of Vietnam in this way. On the 4th day we arrived at the Cu Chi tunnels and were glad that this was just a brief stop on the way rather than taking a special tour to see them. We think we've been a bit spoilt by the passed few days as this major attraction proved to be a bit of a disappointment. Big tour groups of around 30 people herded round the various tunnels. When we got to the mega-expensive AK47 shooting range we ditched the guide and took ourselves round the rest of it (which did get us told off by a guard!). We came away with a sense of disappointment as we'd been looking forward to seeing the tunnels, along with a sense of admiration for the people who lived in them - they really were very small!

And then we arrived in Saigon . . .