A month goes pretty quickly, and we’ve only scratched the surface of seeing Vietnam, but our 30-day visa will expire in a few days and so we need to get outta here! We both feel like we’ve gotten to know a bit about Vietnam in the last weeks, but we also know there’s a lot more to explore that will have to wait until “next time”, whenever that may be. It’s been a great experience. Just from the reactions of fellow travelers when showing them our photos, we know we’ve seen more than most people on this trip, taking the roads less traveled. And the people have been amazing.
Today, we needed to cycle about 47 miles from Van Gia Town to Nha Trang to catch a 3:30 bus to Dalat. It should be fine, but traveling by bike is always a bit less sure than by car.
We left our hotel just before 7AM, having appreciated the sunrise as we sipped our coffee/tea and I had some muesli. It was about 80+ degrees at 7AM and the forecast was for 100 degrees! Sun shirts!
The beginning of the day included a bunch of rougher roads and small tracks with sand and loose dirt that had us wondering about the schedule, but we soldiered on and made it to Nha Trang central bus station by 1PM. The maps don’t really show what the road surface is going to be, so it’s hard to predict what you will encounter. Having gotten VERY DIRTY today, we stopped a couple miles before the bus station and washed our bikes, making as sure as possible that our bikes would be accepted on the bus, since we didn’t know for certain that our bikes would be accepted. You can’t book bike transport online.
On the bike washing front, it took a few tries, but we found someone who would lend us his water hose to rinse our bikes off at a small motor bike garage. He seemed happy that we gave him 50,000 vnd ($2) for his help.
It’s always a bit of a performance to transport bikes, and today was no exception. We presented our tickets for transport and told the person we wanted to buy transport for our bikes. Well, it’s doesn’t work that way. The place that sells the tickets for bikes on the same bus is 4 miles down the road, and so we were instructed to go there, buy the bike tickets and then wait for the bus to come pick us and our bikes up at that location. Seemed weird but we went, having little option. Down the road, the place they directed us to is the shipping arm of the bus company, Futa Express instead of Futa Bus. Using Google Translate, we communicated what we wanted and they filled out some forms and collected some money from us (about $12 for the 2 bikes) and told us our bikes would be taken to Dalat. They wrapped some cardboard around the seats and put shipping labels on the front bars and we went out for a beer and lunch. Returning, our bikes were gone, having left for Dalat already on the first available bus. We hope it’s going to the same station as us!
Our bus came. It’s the first time we have taken a sleeper bus. This is additionally a VIP Sleeper bus, which might be better? On entering the bus, you take off your shoes and put them in a bag and then are given a little bed berth that is pretty nice! You can lay down and sleep and there’s a video screen and USB charging port and lighting. Pretty nice! Our tickets were about $10 each, for a 4-hour bus trip.
We arrived in Dalat about an hour ahead of schedule. At some point there was a violent lurch of the bus, as it avoided crashing into 2 motorbikes that had collided right in front of it. First accident we’ve seen this trip. Chris witnessed the whole thing since she had a window berth.
As we got off the bus in Dalat, we asked the driver where we could find our bikes? He shrugged his shoulders and rolled his eyes and then went back in the bus and left! Oh well…we figured it out. It ended up being easy and everything again worked fine. The bikes were in the Futa Express area of the same bus station.
It was cool outside, like 70 degrees, which felt great. Dalat is a very hilly place, and it was past dark when we took off to find our apartment. After a few false moves (like 5-6?) we found the place. Addresses in Vietnam are not as easy as they could be. We showered, did a little shopping and bought a couple bahn mi for dinner, along with a couple bottles of Dalat wine. All the wine from Vietnam we’ve seen comes from here, so there was plenty!
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