Monday Day One of the big ride, and I don't mind admitting to being a bit fretted. It's only the test day, so it won't be too arduous, but still, I have no idea whether this country of charming oompah loompahs is really going to have a big enough bike. I'm also praying that the ironmongery I have grumblingly humped all round Asia (cycling shoes with cleats, my own pedals and a giant stem extension) is going to fit their kit. I needn't have worried. Well not abo...

I've just come from the War Remnants Museum. I'm a bit emotional. I could have expected the deluge of harrowing facts and photos, particularly about napalm and Agent Orange. The scale of the damage done was deeply shocking but not a surprise to me, although I hadn't appreciated that the deformities caused by dioxins were full genetic mutations and have therefore become hereditary. What the US did was horrific but that isn't a waiver entitling the communist ...

Oh dear. I'm becoming quite the travel slut. I'm falling in love with Vietnam too. It quickly becomes clear that this is far and away the most 'foreign' place I've ever been. As always, it's the little things... Phone wires are hung above the streets in magnitudes that block out the sun. The architecture is a miscellany of communist horrors, shiny glazed blocks and French beauties. The language is utterly impassable. Yogurt bars are where young people hang out...

French fried eel. Barbecued venison in Five spice. Sautéed frog in curry. The food here is almost as wonderful as the gaffs in the English translations.

I seem to recall there being an arab form of execution called Death by a Thousand Cuts. If you need to fly into Vietnam you will face a variant: Near Death by a Thousand Paper Cuts. Take a chair, take a book, take a Valium, take a deep breath, and take the pain. There should have been a sign saying 'Welcome to the Visa Desk. Today we are celebrating F_ck with the Foreigners Day'. Oddly that would have been helpful. It would have involved having a sign, for exa...