Day 17
Country
New year's day - we were up and out of the damp-ridden hotel by 7.30 am. Had Banh Mi by road side with a mango smoothie and headed towards Hue (pronounce 'who way') but we never made it. This is why I love travelling by bike and not making any plans and pre-booking accommodation or signing up for a guided tour. Our lack of plan meant we just went with the flow.
We rode the legendary Hải Vân pass made famous by Top Gear. It was a great, twisty, mountainous road with stupendous views but the road surface was very worn and bumpy. To be honest the Khanh Le pass near Dalat and parts of the Ho Chi Minh trail between Khe Sanh and Phong Nha were much better roads.
Anyway at the bottom of Haivan pass we stopped for a break near Lăng Cô town and were looking at the map and spotted Bąch Mã national park and decided to go there instead. It was around midday when we got there. The forest ranger Mr Cam was in the ticket office / reception. He told us that bikes were not allowed in the park. Only pedestrians or cars were allowed in. As the summit of Bąch Mã was some 18 km away it was too late to go in as pedestrians and we did not have a car. We got chatting to Mr Cam and he invited us to his office and out came the beers as it was Tet. He had taught himself an incredible array of bird and animal calls and demonstrated them all to us. At length - male cuckoo, female cuckoo, male pheasant, female pheasant, squirrels, frogs....yawn!
He also told us that he could arrange a hire car for us for the following day which was brilliant! So we had to find somewhere to stay nearby and call him later to see if he had a car for us. But we still had the afternoon so we went to see the Thuy Dien Slippery Fall. Don't ask! It wasn't much more than a stream where you could dangle your feet in the cool water.
We thought we'd head to the nearby coast and find somewhere to stay but ended up buying the locals a load of beer at fishing village. We had taken a wrong turn and had stopped to get our bearings and have a cool drink when some people from across the way came over to say hello and to wish us Chúc mừng năm mới or Happy New Year. Everyone was happy and laughing and we had a fab time. More and more villagers came and joined us and at one time there were probably 15 of them. As beer was so cheap (30p a can) and they all seemed to share it didn't cost us more than £2 all afternoon. One of the ladies had a baby and she kept thrusting it at Ron and asking for money. We thought she was trying to sell the baby but we learnt later that for new year all children get given "lucky money" often in a red envelope. After a couple of hours everyone just got up and left. Just like that. Party is over. Something we said?
We got up to leave only to discover that my rear tyre was flat. It had a watch strap pin stuck in it. So much for us getting to the coast. Found a local tyre repair shop and got it fixed and paid over the odds as it was New Year's day but it was still cheap. Ron found us somewhere to stay nearby while I was getting my bike fixed. We had steered clear of staying at Nha Nghis so far. A Nha Nghi is a guesthouse and is usually someone's private home extended/converted to accommodate paying guests. We were warned by the bike rental company's website to avoid these because they'd not be as clean as we might want, bed linen may not have been changed etc. However, this one seemed clean enough and we slept in our sleeping bags on the beds. It was certainly cheap but very noisy as it was on the highway.
