We met up with the Italian cyclist again. Heinz is his name and he is actually from a northern part of Italy where they speak German. As he was a bit unsure of the route he road with us today.

Out of nowhere we passed a vegan place. Awesome food for a great price and one of the people who worked there knew pretty good English and was stoked we were vegan.

We split up with Heinz for a bit in the hills. Again the heat was worse than the climbing.

It was amazing how quickly the landscape changed. Even the local people in this area seemed to have their own ways.

We met back up with Heinz in town and were happy to find a hotel. This was the one stop we were a bit worried about, since the Internet didn’t come up with anything and we were just going with a tip from another blog. Off to go try and track down some dinner.

We met back up with the Italian cyclist and had a chance to exchange route plans over breakfast.
After that things got exciting. On our way to more Cham Towers, one of the phones was left behind in a taxi. Just missing him, we jumped in another taxi and went back to where he picked us up. There was no sign of him but we recognized someone the driver was talking with earlier, and with a translator app on the other phone, and a bit of luck, explained the situation. He made a call and a few minutes later the phone was back. We gave him some money for hassle. Also, in the confusion we accidentally paid the second taxi driver ten times the fare! Still it could have been a lot worse and the driver got a laugh when we asked him to bring us back to the towers, which he did free of charge.

These date around the 8th century making the towers we saw previously seem brand new. From there we checked out a Buddhist pagoda and another giant Buddha statue. As the monks are vegetarian, there was a veg restaurant right on the grounds of the pagoda so we had some lunch. After a visit to the beach and a local microbrewery we called it a night.

This morning we headed out to sea for some snorkeling. There are some reefs just off the coast of Nha Trang.

Saw some crazy sea creatures.

The area is quite beautiful and is one of the best spots for snorkeling and diving in the country.

From here, we cut inland and begin our two day climb to Dalat.

More hills, headwinds, and heat made for a pretty brutal ride yesterday. Got to the hotel at 4:30 ate some ramen in the room and went to bed. The scenery was pretty nice though, maybe the best we have seen so far.

We saw a couple of cyclists on a tandem heading North. Waves were exchanged but both parties continued on, too tired for a ‘stop and chat.’ We also met an Italian on a bike also heading to HCMC while searching for a hotel. He started his journey in Hue.

Also this happened.

Today was a pretty tough ride. Constant ups and downs, then a head wind at the end that made the downs feel like more ups. Some pretty nice views though. The heat also got turned way up. All this after a later than usual start because of a second GI illness.
.

We have been surviving on fruit, ramen, white rice, 50¢ Red Bulls, and the occasional plate of fried vegetables. Communicating beyond simple exchanges at shops has proved to be near impossible. Most of our attempts at Vietnamese are incomprehensible since pronunciation is so important. Even a slight change in pitch can completely change the meaning of the word. Unfortunately only the junk food at the rare supermarket has English ingredients labeled.

For parts of today’s ride we had to share the shoulder with drying rice.

The route had some ups and downs today and continued to be lined with shops and homes, although at times it opened up for long stretches making for some nice scenery.

Another short day, no rain, no flats with more friendly, interested people. It’s fun trying to have a conversation when neither party knows the other’s language.

This is the smallest town we have stayed in so far. But our hotel is a short walk to the beach with a great view.

We had a chance to throw together some random video clips from a few days ago.

We have been ahead of schedule so we decided to take a day off and visit this museum just outside of town. It is a memorial to those killed during the My Lai massacre, at the actual site of the tragedy.

There 504 civilians including very young children were killed.

This event was originally covered up by the US government, the aggressors were given commendations and the few soldiers who tried to stop it were seen as traitors. After investigations the roles reversed the whistleblowers are now seen as heroes and more than 20 US soldiers were tried for war crimes.

There is really too much history to sum up in a quick post. We would recommend looking into it further if you are as unfamiliar as we were with the event. Hopefully we can learn from the past.