Blog : Mui Ne

Kate and I got up really early on our last morning in Da Lat, to catch the bus to Mui Ne, a Watersports town on the coast, according to Lonely Planet. We got up, packed and checked out of our room, ready for the 7am bus, which didn't bloody show up until after eight in the morning - ggrrrr! And worst still, it wasn't one if the big sleeper busses we were used to, that although being gross, do at least have legroom and air con on the whole, it was a minibus - one of those ones you would get to take you on an hours drive max, because your knees are in your armpits and you have to have your backpack on your lap... Yes, we got on a minibus like that, for our five hour journey, oh and there was no aircon either. The bus was absolutely full to the brim, quite literally, with suitcases filling the aisle and everything! Kate and I were virtually on top of each other and Jesus I started sweating almost immediately as I'd dressed for cold, hard aircon, so my silky trousers were pretty quickly sodden trousers. The bus seemed to be offering a bit of a local taxi service too, we had a young family board, a monk and a couple of old ladies, who all miraculously crammed onto three seats at the front, next to the driver. We drove with the door and sun roof open which was nice for all two minutes, after which we realised it was just scorching, sandy air being pelted in our faces. Needless to say it wasn't my favourite bus journey! We arrived in Mui Ne just after lunch though and walked the kilometre or so with our backpacks on, in the mid-day towards the cheaper end of the small town, which was really just a holiday strip for Russians again (like Nha Trang). We found some relatively cheap accommodation, Green Hill, which was $7 a night each and the room had two fans and was pretty alright, it was back to sharing a double bed again though - sweatyyy!! The hotel was still under build at the back and so we recon that's why we got it at quite a cheap rate, as we were woken really early the next day by the sound of building work.

After we'd checked in and both had a shower to cool down, we got our beach bits ready and went out in search of some accommodation for us plus Al and Christa for the following night, when they would have arrived. We walked through a resort to have a look at the beach and we found that a lot of it was concreted all the way up to the sea and the sandy bit was full of kite surfers whizzing in and out of the sea and learners getting set up on the beach. We found a little hotel that had two rooms at a reasonable price again on the beach side of the road, that had a little garden with lots of sun lingers before a little tiny patch of sand and then the sea. We booked it later, after we realised that there was next to no where to sit on the beach whilst being out if the way of the kite surfers and also not on a private lounger that costed £5 a day! The sand on the beach was that really fine stuff and obviously with the good kite surfing, the wind was pretty strong, so the sand got whipped up and blown everywhere in the gusts. It was actually pretty unpleasant as it went in our eyes so we couldn't ready, in our ears so we had to turn our backs to the wind and all in our beach bags, which for me was the last straw! We packed up and headed for our hotel for the following night to catch the last of the rays, before heading home to shower, read the Lonely Planet tips on the town and call both my boy and my mummatron.

We headed out to dinner later that night, to a local seafood place which was a top pick on trip advisor. We got there and it was full of as many Vietnamese looking people as foreigners (Russians, Russians and more Russians). We were both absolutely starving after a pretty disappointing lunch and so we ordered a fresh spring roll to start, which came with a sort of peanut satay sauce - absolutely delish :) and prawns cooked in garlic and ginger, which literally melted in my mouth and also a cucumber salad on the side, which I thought would be like a little garden salad but was literally just a plate of shaved cucumber and there must have been at least two cucumbers in the huge pile of it! Our dinner well and truely filled us up though and it was pretty cheap too. The restaurant itself was basic, with plastic chairs and hectic waiter service, but it was on a little patio, right by the sea and had cute lighting and felt quite traditional. Half way through out meal, a stoned looking forty something year old passed us and said something in Russian, until he realised we were English and before we knew it, we were in a heated and very one side debate with this French Canadian about whether our queen should have rule of Canada and blah blah blah! kate and i did t really have any clue what to say back so just nodded but he seemed to think he'd upset us so later he kept coning up to our table to check if we were ok! We really enjoyed it dinner though and after we'd paid up, we went for a little walk further down the strip to see if we could find somewhere for a drink. We ended up in a place ran by Americans we thought, where some bloke was crooning through old soppy songs and creating and almost too chilled atmosphere. We ordered some pretty creaming and sickly cocktails, figuring we'd treat ourselves! Mine was meant to be banana, mango and vodka and I asked for no whipped cream but there was definitely half a tub of ice cream or something dairy in it as it was disgustingly thick and creamy and the alcohol in it just made it taste pretty rank, but it was expensive so I drank it slowly, letting the ice melt to dilute it! I half thought that the dairy would encourage my stomach to get its act together and start shooting out waste again a bit more regularly, but to no avail - day five with no poo, again :/

We got up pretty late the next morning after not setting an alarm and slowly checked out of our first hotel, Green Hill and headed over the road to our American place from the evening before, Joes, for breakfast. I had crepes with a mini fruit salad and home fries which was an absolutely massive portion and kept me going almost until dinner time! We then moved our backpacks to our new room, in Hiep Hoa. As we begin the checking in process I noticed the wifi password and so reached for my phone to log on to it and nearly had a heart attack realising I'd left it in the seat at Joes. I legged it down the road, the 200m or so, praying that someone hadn't taken it, as we had been sitting right next to the road, hoping and hoping it would still be there. I got to our table and there it was in full view in the middle of the sofa - thank god!! I realised in that moment how valuable having an iPhone whilst were travelling is and it took a fair old while for my heart rate to calm back down!

We spent the rest of the afternoon sunbathing in the hotel garden on the loungers and reading our books, which was very chilled and much needed for both of us! Al and Christa arrived mud afternoon from their bus with similar stories of no aircon and an awful journey. They were hungry and tired so decided to go for food and a nap before dinner. Kate, Christa and I got a cab to a recommended pizza place as we were all absolutely starving and fancied Italian rather than fish and small Vietnamese portions!! I ordered pesto ravioli which was yummy, especially with the whole bowl of tasty Parmesan that I was given. I did have to try and ignore the several rats I could see running around the side bit next to the restaurant because I really didn't want to be put off my food! They were huge, black and disgusting though and I had to sit on my feet as I couldn't keep them on the floor, just in case...! The food wS nice but quite expensive for our modest budgets, so i was a complete skank and ran across the road to a stall to buy a water - over half the price cheaper than the restaurant! Next we met Al in a smart looking bar called Sankara, which was hosting a St Paddys day party, with green themed drinks and a free shot for those in the Irish colour. We all ordered a green and interesting sounding cocktail, which tasted alright and some Apple and mint shisha, which had become my most favoured thing! It's cheaper than alcohol, doesn't give me a hangover and is pretty sociable, it's definitely on my list of new things I like, that i'll be bringing home with me! It was a bit awkward in the bar because we sensed everyone knew eachother from the kite surfing community and we were the newbies that the girls glared at and the boys dismissed as we quite clearly weren't fellow kite surfers, but pack packers with no where near enough money to pay for lessons, which I guess made us not worth conversation! We did talk to a few people, but I still couldn't get my head around Mui Ne, like Nha Trang, being a holiday destination of choice for young 18 year olds, surrounded by Russian people and a tame Vietnamese party scene, over somewhere like Greece, Ibiza or even Thailand! We then moved via doubling up on two motorbike taxis, to anther bar, which although had the potential to be cool, was mainly empty, had ridic expensive drinks and a god awful DJ! We got home around 2am and slept soundly and peacefully, listening to the sea and the waves crashing against the concrete only meters away through our open door and windows.

Al woke us the following morning to a beautiful day and as we clambered out if bed, Kate and Christa decided they'd like to stay another day before heading down to HCMC and Al and I decided we would get the bus that day and go and see Helen, who had missed Mui Ne in order to sort out her visa for India and so was in HCMC already. We had breakfast in Joes again and I had the blueberry French toast which was disappointingly soggy and the f***ing waitress knocked over the pot of syrup on my plate all over my home fried without even an apology or the offer for new potatoes, so breakfast wasn't great for me. Al and I packed and sat and read for a bit in the secluded coolness of the room before taking out bags to the bus office and waiting, whilst pouring with buckets and buckets of sweat pouring from every hole to board and be on our way to HCMC!

Mui Ne is famous for its sand dunes, which you can slide down, but because of time expense and the fact that I really wasn't bothered by seeing more sand dunes (they're all the same right and I'v e seen them everywhere) so we didnt go on that tourist trap trip, saving us some precious money and buying more sun time! I did enjoy Mui Ne but I was also quite happy to leave as, as a town, it wasn't very pretty or interesting to look around and was absolutely full with Russians - so much so that we all realised it was the first place we'd ever been in our whole lives where the first tourist language hasn't been English!!