Moving up the coast of Central Vietnam

From Dal Lat we took a long (10 hours) bus ride. First we rode through some beautiful green mountains down to the coastal city of Nha Trang. We decided not to stop there so as to avoid the big tourist scene in that resort city known for its great beaches, night life, snorkling and offshore islands with clear water. The bus continued up the coast until reaching the coastal city of Quy Nhon, where we stayed in a three star hotel by the beach.

The next day, we rented a motor bike and explored the area south of the city, trying to find a nice beach. We visited a small seaside village off the main road where we bought some coconuts to drink and tried to communicate with some of the people which was difficult. We did find a beautiful beach, which unfortunately had quite a bit of garbage that had washed up on the beach or been discarded by previous visitors.

The following morning we had intended to take a large, comfortable bus north, but in front of the main bus terminal in Quy Nhon, there was a large van, the kind that has about 18 seats in it. We were persuaded to get on the van, since the crew promised to leave right away and give us the front seats. The problem was that once on the bus we had to wait for more than an hour in the heat while the crew tried to hustle up more passengers. Then the bus drove around the city looking for more passengers; a few more got on and soon we were full. But that was not good enough because when we finally got going, the bus driver kept slowing down whenever he saw people along the road who might want to have a ride with us. The bareshirted helper would lean out the open door and yell something that I guess meant something like "attention do you want a ride?" The worst part about this 4 hour ride, though, was that the driver was racing with another similar van. Each driver wanted to get in front of the other in order to have an opportunity to cram more people into the bus. These drivers passed other vehicles in blind spots, not as dangerous as it sounds since Vietnamese drivers are ready for this and cooperate to avoid collisions, but our driver would sometimes go over 60 miles an hour in the crowded streets of the towns we passed weaving around and scattering pedestrians, bikes, and motorbikes to avoid collisions. We were so scared that I made motions to the driver to slow down, but he didn't listen.

We got off on the outskirts of Quang Nai City from where we took two motorcycle taxis to the coastal village of Mi Khe. Unfortunately, the nice hotel was full, but we found a nearby restaurant that rented us a primitive bungaloo that would have to do for the night. Van, the 40 year old woman in charge of this place spoke a little English and impressed us with her genuine concern for and interest in us. She and the other women here are so hard-working and really try to keep the place clean. This is difficult to do because the evening customers who come to enjoy the seafood like to party and make quite a mess of the place. Van has two children who live in a nearby village and a husband in the army.