Beaches, bars, Valentines Day and Vinpearl

We arrived 2 hours earlier in Nha Trang at 4am homeless and tired. After checking a few hotels and getting the wave of no room in the inn we took refuge in 24 hour bar Oasis Bar & Restaurant. It was the perfect base serving food (I got eggs benedict and Luke got the Oasis salad), drink and a tv playing films. Once the sun came up Neil did the rounds looking for anywhere to stay! Nothing! Then finally we found a place that cost 1,000,000 dong a night, owned by an angry unfriendly old lady. We took it and showered and napped.

Nha Trang was a holiday destination that seemed popular with the Russians. The beach was lovely with white sand and big waves that knocked you down. The night life was lively enough with everyone ending up in Why Not Bar and drinking through the vast list of drink deals! Why Not Buckets ruined us all the boys more so, manoeuvring Neil through the roads and mopeds and getting home and finding Luke asleep wrapped around the toilet.

We moved hotels and got a place in a lovely boutique hotel with a downstairs bakery cafe that served all Neil's favourites, carrot cake and pain au chocolate! Their selection of fanny ice cream was delicious to lol! It wasn't cheap but cheaper than the last place for the two nights. It had a rooftop bar and restaurant and did a brilliant included breakfast with a view. The vietnamese lady who ran the hotel was really helpful and let us use the room to shower and have our breakfast when our bus had been delayed from 7am to 11:30.

We had a lovely Valentines Day with Josh and Luke being sweethearts and giving us a night alone. We had seen guys eating a pizza the day before and it looked legit so we decided to have a meal at Fernando's (brilliant)! It was owned by an Italian man who would come round and chat to everyone which was nice. We shared a vegetable gratin (broccoli and carrots with cheese) and both ordered pepperoni pizza but i ordered mine with vegetables and glass of red. Neil's came out and looked tasty and mine followed and of all the vegetables to put on a pizza mine came out with BROCCOLI and CARROTS!!! What a liberty?! Once I picked off the random vegetables the pizza was lovely and we had the left overs in front of the tv at the hotel.

Têt has been a slight pain in the ass while travelling around Vietnam as everything has been overpriced and crowded, which was no different from the Disney style island Vinpearl. We (Josh, Luke, Charly, Jon, Claudia, Emma & Geordie) had chose a day with the best weather but it was so busy with queues to get on the impressive cable car to the island. The views were amazing as we passed over the sea. The Vietnamese people seemed to treat us with mixed attitudes one in particular group where not very nice and pointed and laughed and the tone of the main guys group seemed quite mocking, while others smiled and babies looked curiously. Vinpearl was a crazy place with a waterpark with some wicked slides, kamikaze, tsunami and space holes. Twisted and turned and dropped us it was a lot if fun! There was a beautiful beach and wonderful to chill out on in the glorious sunshine. It was covered with people. We whizzed through the busy aquarium and i got to ride the panda on the netty go round, and whooed on the pirate ship. Then for a huge hour wait to go in the alpen coastline ride, which was a tracked luge ride. The queuing was chaotic and Neil and Josh couldn't handle it and waited for us. It was dark by the time we hot our go but well worth it! Going at night was fantastic as you went up the track it looked like you could reach the stars. The track was lit up in multicolour and the big Vinpearl sign shined brightly in the dark. It was fun controlling the car yourself, I was a taxi driver at one point when a guy hopped on for a quick lift. Once he got off i whizzed past hitting the highest speed (30mph) round the track. We went on the last roller coaster and got into another queue for the cable car back. The lights of the cable car line lit up like mini Eiffel Towers cheesy but wonderful.

I had a great day but found some of the children had no manners or patience pushing and shoving while queuing and pushing you off rubber rings and grabbing them so they could have their go on the slide. Would have been better to go when it wasn't so busy but all the queues moved fast enough.

It was Jon's birthday 16th so we celebrated 15th at Vinpearl as we were leaving 16th. We had dinner at a place called Lanterns in Nha Trang. A Vietnamese restaurant that gives its profit to helping the poor families in the community. Providing weekly free meals and food packages. It was a lovely place with red lanterns that covered the ceiling and entrance pond. We were all tired from the fun day but was a lovely birthday meal. I had fish and rice and shared spring rolls with Neil who had chilli lemongrass chicken (our Vietnamese favourite).

After the meal we all headed back to our hotels and said our goodbyes as we were all leaving on different dates. We had to be up early the next day, 7am to be on the bus so we set our alarm and fell asleep watching the beach. The next morning to our horror we woke up at 7am - unsure how we had missed our alarm we rushed around the room cramming our stuff into any bag we could find. We ran out the room, still in pyjamas, and neil payed the hotel whilst I ran ahead to hold up the bus! When I got there at 7.08am Luke, josh and claudia where all still waiting? Neil arrived soon after and we waited another half hour till being informed our bus would now in fact be at 11!! WTF? We staggered back to our hotel in hope of our complimentary breakfast, a nap and our shower! The lovely lady at reception let us have our room back until 11, all was well - every cloud has a lining and all that!