Chrass Landing

One of the craziest roads we experienced was going into and out of Đà Lạt.

Looking back from the road at a part we had already covered.

Map of the Road to Đà Lạt

The road to Đà Lạt as seen from Grady

I didn’t especially like Đà Lạt itself (too touristy) and about the only noteworthy thing that happened there was when Grady and I wound up at an empty American style blues bar run by a Mr. Dong.

At least the street food was good.

Mr. Dong spoke excellent English and we played Connect 4 with him (he’s a total shark).  He showed us his pride and joy –a mint Bonus motorcycle.  He offered to let us ride it (considering our state of inebriation, we declined). We did, however, take him up on his offer to give us a ride back to our hotel on it.

Countryside leaving Đà Lạt

[This entry was written on 2011-05-12 but I've changed the date so it'll show up in the correct order.]

Gordon had gotten about 30km ahead of us by sunset, and while Grady and I stayed in some quiet, beach side, cottages in Cà Ná, Gordon had made it to the much more metropolitan Phan Rang where he promptly met some locals and went out partying with them and their families.

This was the view from the porch of my $5/night cottage in Cà Ná

The next morning, Grady and I left Cà Ná and met up with Gordon and his new friends in Phan Rang.

Lan was the English speaker of the group and he seemed eager for us to hang out for another night.

A whole bunch of boats somewhere between Mũi Né and Cà Ná

After a bit of discussion we decided we could afford to spend an unplanned extra night in Phan Rang. We finished our coffee and checked into the hotel Gordon had found the night before.

The hotel was the nicest we had seen so far. It even had an elevator. I realized I hadn’t seen an elevator in almost a week.

View from my Cà Ná hotel room

That evening we went to a karaoke bar with Lan, his friends, and his wife. I am normally religiously opposed to karaoke, but in this case I decided not to protest.

Phan Rang People (from left) Mr. Sing, Lan, some guy named "Gary" or "Gravy" or something like that, and Lan

Karoake in Vietnam (or at least at this particular place in Phan Rang) is different. Members of the audience do not sign up to sing. Instead a two piece band plays along to recorded music and professional karaoke singers sing the songs.

All the songs were in Vietnamese and sound alike to me, but the experience was interesting.

On the beer list on the menu was a beverage called “Spy”. I had tried various Vietnamese beers (up to this point 333, Saigon, and Tiger –which is not technically Vietnamese). I asked Lan if Spy was any good. He told me it was.

To my horror, it turned out that Spy is a wine cooler that’s served in stemware. I politely drank it as fast as I could so I could get the sissy beverage bottle away from me as fast as possible.

The next morning we headed off to Đà Lạt.

[This post was written on May 5th, but I've re-dated it so that it will show up in the correct order.]

So far the greatest distance we’ve ridden in one day was about 230km.  We were in Pleiku yesterday and Hội An seemed just within reach about 350km away.  We could theoretically do it if we really got up early, pushed hard, kept our breaks short, remained foolishly optimistic, and had no mechanical trouble.  It would require we average about 40km/h (including breaks).

That last item was the wild card.  We had not had a single day where we didn’t visit a mechanic.  Luckily mechanics are cheap, but they consume time.

We started heading north on the Ho Chi Minh highway.  It was pretty straight and dull but we eventually started climbing into the mountains and it became very interesting.

The Specter of Communism has been suspiciously reliable except for needing its clutch replaced.  Minsk parts are very hard to find, but luckily I had a couple of extra clutch plates already (they were at the bottom of the saddle bags that Son had given me with my purchase).

Unfortunately the Specter of Communism is not as fast at climbing hills as the Chinese Wins that Gordon and Grady are riding.  On the steeper 10% grades I could only climb at 40km/h in second gear with the engine revving so high it sounded like it might explode.  I was leading yesterday, so Grady and Gordon would wait patiently about 10 feet behind me until we crested.

The tortuous climbs aside, the less steep climbs and the downhill portions were fan-fucking-tastic!  The road surface was pretty good and traffic was relatively light.  The curves were very technical, and we were making great time.  To make things exciting there would occasionally be big ass rocks in the middle of the road or oncoming trucks in the left lane for no particular reason –always a welcome sight when you’ve got your bike leaned over 35 degrees through a blind curve.

By the time we got to “highway” 14B we only had about 40km to go with about 100 minutes of daylight left.  Easy peasy.

We turned off the Ho Chi Minh Highway where the GPS told us and went through an alley in a village onto a one-lane dirt road.  The GPS maps we’re using are both free and pretty good, but every now and then they let us down.  I stopped near a woman, pointed down the road and said “Hoi An”.  I fought the urge to say “Hoi An?” because pronouncing it as a question would mean I would be saying “Hoi Án” which probably means “I want to eat your house”.  As usual, she had no idea what I was saying.  I said it a few more times.  She eventually said “Hộ̣i An” (only they can hear the difference) and pointed down the road.

Okay, 40km on a dirt road shouldn’t be a problem on our bikes.  The Specter of Communism adores rough terrain.  We’ve certainly handled far worse (I’m looking at you highway into and out of Da Lat).  All we needed to do is get out of the village, stand on the pegs, and open up our bikes to maybe 50km/h.  We’d be in Hội An in well under an hour.

The dirt eventually gave way to a single lane of pavement.  Then eventually two lanes.  Unfortunately the village never ended.  Our map colored this road the same way it colors proper two-lane highways.  We were stuck crawling along through markets and kids weaving randomly on bicycles and cows and chickens and dogs and pedestrians.  The village went on and on (and on) for 40km all the way to Hội An.

We arrived in Hội An just before sun down.  354km in Vietnam in one day.  It can be done, but I don’t recommend it.

Now it’s time to get me a tailored suit.