Ok I've been putting this off as I've gotten so far behind but here we go!..

We took a night bus from Hoi An to Nha Trang arriving on Monday 31st. Took an hour longer than expected due to some kind of lorry traffic jam on a hill in the middle of nowhere at about 1am (strange!!) but we survived it! We went straight to the beach after we found somewhere to stay. The beach was beautiful, not what I was expecting to find in Vietnam though! Tuesday we headed back to the beach again in the morning! Then in the afternoon went to a spa where we sat in a mud bath and then a pool of natural hot spring water it was lovely! It was a small heart shaped pool just right for 2, I definitely appreciated the romantic-ness more than Tom did!!

So Wednesday we set off on probably the most adventurous trip we've taken so far.. a 3 day journey with the easy riders!!! There were us 2 and another couple from Denmark, we each had our own driver. They strapped our bags onto the back of the motorbikes (good job they were good sized bikes I was a bit worried it wouldn't be able to take my bag! It didn't get off to the best start, we saw a road accident between a lorry and a moped, really horrific. Our drivers told us it happens quite often because the lorries go from Hanoi to Saigon on one single highway, its about 32 hours drive and they have no laws to say they need breaks so they fall asleep at the wheel. It poured with rain later in the morning but luckily the guys had waterproof suits, I looked like a right wally as it was obviously made for a 5'3 Vietnamese man!!..grateful to keep dry though. The rain passed by lunch time and we made lots of stops seeing different things including a coffee bean and cacao plantation, sugar cane fields and rubber trees. We stopped for the night in Buon Ma Thuot City, somewhere with very few westerners, you could tell this just by the funny looks we were getting! The easy riders took us out for tea, we had fresh shrimp (still moving when they brought it out) barbequed, and beef which I actually liked! Next morning we got back on the road, stopping to see a huge waterfall. Later we stopped at some lady's house and before I knew it she was putting a big snake around my neck!!!!! Talk about shocked, well the photo says it all! Not content with this the crazy lady then draped it over my head like a hair band, WAY too close to my face for my liking!!! Tom found this hilarious untill it was his turn haha! The nights stop was a homestay in the M'nong minority peoples village. They were all really friendly, the houses were mostly wooden ones on stilts and there were loads of animals around, including elephants!! Next morning we 'hit the road' again! Stopped to see a tea plantation, a big laughing Buddah (and I mean huge!) and a silk factory. Got to Dalat that evening and we were both tired out!

Would have liked to have spent a bit longer in Dalat but we had to check out and get the bus to Saigon the next morning. On the bus is where we met Tom and Lisa from New Zealand, they are really cool! Checked into the same hotel and the next day (Sunday) went on a trip to the Cu Chi Tunnels together. The tunnels are were the North Vietnamese used to hide out in the war when they were trying to attack the South. We got to go down one of the tunnels, almost had to crawl as they were really tight. It was so hot and claustrophobic I don't know how people used to stay down there for weeks at a time. That afternoon we found the post office in Saigon and sent parcels of all the things we bought in Hoi An, both of our bags are a lot lighter after this!!

Monday we made our way to the airport for our flight to Bangkok, quite a coincidence but Kiwi Tom and Lisa had the same flight as us!.. Said goodbye to Vietnam, we have loved it and could have spend so much longer in all of the places (except maybe Hoi An due to too many tempting shops, if I win the lottery though thats the first place I'll be going!!!)

Thats all for now, got a load more to say about Thailand but that will have to wait for another day!....

Miss you all xxxxxxx