22/10/09 Nha Trang (Friday)

We all had a terrible night sleep and Liz woke first to see a lovely sunrise over the coastline we were driving past. It was only about 5.30 but all the fishermen were out and little boats were moving about the water in a pink haze. The others woke too and as we drove into Nha Trang we were all amazed to see hundreds of people at the beach swimming and joining excercise classes. We even wsaw a couple having wedding photos taken and it was 6am !!! The bus driver did the usual trick of dropping us off at a mates hotel but we could walk to ours as it wasn't far. Phil went off to confirm our bus for the next day but the office was closed so we went to check in at the hotal. Liz had a shower while Phil went again to the office but it was closed still. We were booked onto a day trip (remember no sleep) so couldn't go to the officeagain.We asked reception to call the office which she did and they said our seats were reserved but we needed to call in to the office lafer after our tour. Cool. Phil bought us a couple of cow cheese rolls from one of the street vendors. as we were starving. We were picked up on time for the trip and driven to the harbour to board a boat for the day. NHa Trang has a massive beach itself but is a pretty big city so many tourists head out on boats to see the islands just off Nha Trang. The Mama Lihn tour started with a visit to Mun island where there were areas of reef to snorkel at for a small extra fee. The masks were so scratched we decided not to bother as we dhad been snorkelling so much in Australia. We had quite a giggle watching the Vietnamese who who cannot swim cling to big life rings and have a go at snorkelling. We saw one chap in the water with just a snorkel but no mask wearing his reading glasses in the water. He was diving under and coming back up looking pretty happy but goodness knows what he thought he could see !!! He was covered in round briuses all over his back from cupping, a chinese medicine technique for drawing disease from your body!! We sailed on to Mot island for lunch of a big buuffet style lunch on the boat. It was pretty good food and we all ate our fill before getting off the boat at a floating platform for water sports. Some people were jet skiing and some were parasailing but we just watched. Next we heard a loud shout from our female guide who called us back to the boat for the entertainment. She and three other crew members climbed onto a makeshift stage with a drum kit made of plastic kegs and bits of old scrap and started an unexpected concert. They launched enthusiastically into some western tunes we all knew and they got us all up daning and singing along. A few different passengers were dragged to the stage to join them and sing a song from their country. Liz got picked and joined them singing Yellow Submarine which she only knows those two worlds from unfortunately !! Phil was very unimpressed with her efforts and filmed it all for everoyne at home to have a good laugh at. At the end two spanish speakers got up and sang La Bamba then the band finished with a Vietnamese song all the Vietnamese joined in with.It was very bizarre but really good fun, not quite the entertainment we were expecting. Next the guide announced that the floating bar was open and poiunted to one of the crew who was in the water in a rubber ring with a box of wine on his lap. Anyone in the water could get free drinks so there was a mad exodus off the boat to get a free glass of wine. We all jumped into the warm sea and drank the pretty rank wine but it was great fun. Once the "bar" got out of the water we all climbed back out too. Once out of the water the crew served up a fruit buffet of all kinds of tropical fruits amd a special chilli salt to dip the pineapple into. The chilli salt was a bit weird so we didn't have too much of it. The last stop of the day was at an aquarium on Mieu Island. We didn't go in but just relaxed on the boat with an icecream till the people who did go came back. We sailed back to the harbour and drove back to our hotel to finish the tour. Once back at the hotel we went straight to the bus office as reqwuested to confirm the tickets. When we got there the guy said the bus was full and we would have to wait another day of pay extra to go with a different company. We explained that the hotel called earlier but he just denied it and was really unhelpful saying it was the hotels fault. We called the hotel from the office and the man and the receptionist spoke. After a few minutes he put down the phoine and said the hotel would have to sort out the problem as the bus was full. We had onward hotels booked and trips etc so it would be a real pain to rearrange stuff but we decided to call Jennifer in Hanoi for some help. As wew ere about to leave another guy showed up on his bike saying it was him the reception had spoken to and he was sorry he hadn't let the other guy know but we did have seats for the next day. We were very relieved and the man asked us if we would like to pay a few dollars more for a sleeper seat on the journey from Dalat to Saigon the next bus after tomorrows one, as it was 9 hours on a bus. We decided to go for it as it would be more comfy for us and left the office feeling happy that it was sorted. Then it dawned on us that we had probably just paid towards the cost of seats on a different bus they had actually forgotten to book our seats and that the Saigon bus was a sleeping bus anyway so you didn't need to upgrade!!! Some Vietnamese are very canny and appear to be extremely helpful but are actually pulling a fast one. We would know if we were right as the bus wouldn't be full when we went to meet it the next day.We headed to the beach for the walk home and strolled along the water front until we reached a gorgeous bar on the beach called Nha Trang sailing club. We stopped for a drink and wedges (about all we run to on our budget) and enjoyed the lovely ambience and views over the ocean. We went for a shower and a change of clothes and watched the end of Rainman which was on the movie channel. We had made loose arrangements to meet the couple from the bus at a local Mexican but had left it open as we hadn't had a lot of sleep on the bus overnight. When we got there we realised it would be too expensive fort he other two on their tight budget and it was a bit too much for us too so we left to find a cheaper place. We had a really nice meal in the cheapest place we found by far. It was quite busy and the food was good. We went to bed pretty quickly after dinner feeling exhausted.