Another cool day with a little less traffic. We had a visitor while stopping for drinks today.
Hard to tell which dogs are strays since they just go about on their own and seem pretty much ignored by people. We've seen signs advertising cats and dogs as food which may explain the disconnection.
We have seen tons of these signs around. We wish we knew what they said.
Dong Ha is a town right on the Ben Hai River, the border around which the DMZ was formed. Today there are tours around the area, and many monuments honoring the North Vietnamese soldiers and their victory.
We met a man named Ting in town, who was very excited when we told him we were American. He said his father was a lieutenant for the South Vietnamese Army during the war, and had many American friends. He spoke candidly for a while with us about which side of the conflict he was on. Very interesting.
Today turned out to be a pretty great day, even though we had the first flat tire of our trip. We fixed it quickly and made it to the Google Hotel by 11:00. No affiliation.
The city is centered around a large citadel that was mostly destroyed during the war. We spent some time walking around inside.
Then we made a stop at a massive outdoor market. There are many exotic fruits here that we had never tried.
This is our bounty, including jackfruit, dragonfruit, mangosteen and the thing in the top right that may be a guava. We are not sure.
We found an amazing vegetarian Buddhist restaurant. Possibly our best meal yet and all this for 95,000 dong ($5 US).
To top that all off we are writing this over free beer, courtesy of google. We will be spending an extra day here for sure.
Today was probably the toughest yet most enjoyable yet. Started off in the rain but it didn't last. This ride included Hai Van Pass which tops out around 1600ft elevation and made for some great views…
…that is until the we reached the fog and had maybe 50 feet of visibility.
We met up with a tour of 60 cyclist from Thailand on the hill. They were fun and all wanted a pictures with us.
We ended the day on China Beach in Da Nang, not too bad.
We took some video from this ride. We'll try to post it here soon.
It rained our entire short ride down the beach, but at this point we are getting used to it. In addition to walking around the city, we took care of retrieving our passports which were not returned to us by the hotel two nights ago. They sent them via bus. It was a bit of a runaround trying to intercept them and the bus driver tried to shake us down for 5 bucks, but we have them back.
Aside from that we had lunch at an all vegan place with some Vietnamese takes on western food. It was so good we are back there right now to try more of the menu. If you are ever in Hoi An be sure to stop at Karma Waters.
Our hotel has an indoor pool so that is the plan for the rest of the evening.
Today started out fine. Our road out of town was more of a bike path.
Unfortunately we spent the rest off the entire day ducking out of the rain.
Also we had another flat to deal with. Including one that we did not mention that makes three so far. Every time, we found what looks like a bristle from a metal brush stuck in our tires. At least it is an opportunity to refine our patching skills.
Dinner was a new record at $1.50 US for the two of us.
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.
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.
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.
Still ahead of schedule so we decided to take another day off as there was much to see right in town. First stop of the morning was the Long Khanh pagoda. It is one of the more elaborate we have seen with a 56ft Buddha statue on its grounds.
If you look close you will notice a swastika on the chest. As it turns out they used the symbol long before the nazis. People here don't seem to be aware or care much as we have seen them repeatedly on architecture throughout the trip.
Next we took a walk to the Thap Doi Cham towers. You can climb inside and look straight up through to the sky. Pretty impressive.
All that plus the beach, another museum and more good food made this a pretty enjoyable stop.
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.
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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.
