Vietnam - Da Nang, Hoi An

Etienne took this photo on Hai Van Pass (Pass of The Ocean Clouds) between Hue and Da Nang. It was the first real pass we went through (1000 meters - 4000 feet), and the first bit of climbing I'd done on my new bike. Since I hadn't really trained sufficiently for the pass, I was pretty much wiped out when I got to the top. I could ride it pretty easily now, but at the time it was a long haul.

Photo Courtesy Et Tienne

On the way down, we met Andrew and Allison who were riding all the way from Hanoi to Saigon, which was the ride I wanted to do but was too chicken to do by myself. They're both management consultants from Canada. They work when they have work, and cycle when they don't. It's a rough life, but somebody's gotta do it.

Here's the whole gang at a Champa museum in Da Nang. This museum was pretty much the other end of the spectrum from the HCM museum in Hanoi. The HCM museum was very weird but interesting. This one was mostly just dull. The kingdom of Champa occupied a good chunk of what is southern Vietnam today. It's borders moved around like all the borders did (and still do), with first the Vietnamese and then the Cambodians either squeezing or being squeezed by the Chams. Vietnam finally swallowed the kingdom. The Chams didn't really build their temples to last. Most were made of bricks or wood, so there are relatively few relics left. This museum showed a lot of influence in the Champa kingdom from various Indian religions and practices. Some of those were integrated somewhat into Vietnamese life.

The one part of the museum that was pretty interesting was looking at the types of statues. The Champa kingdom had substantial influence from India, and through the various periods you see the influence of various Indian religions. Then they had some that were a cross between the Indian religions, and the Vietnamese religions to the north.

This very nicely preserved and restored pagoda is about halfway up the hill at Marble mountain. It has the requisite seven tiers, and is very nicely decorated.

The pagoda was halfway up the hill so I naturally felt compelled to climb the rest of the way up. It was a nice climb, and a nice view although it didn't photograph all that well.

I call this the shot the Drowned Rats. We had rain for the first few days of the ride. I even made a whiny status photo and sent it off to all my friends mentioning the rain, and the rain stopped the very next day.

Leah was riding in the bus, so I gave her my camera and asked her to take some photos. She got a bunch, and here are a few of them.

Everywhere we go that has kids, they tended to swamp us. They were always friendly and curious, and seemed to greatly enjoy the visit. This is Rita, talking to a group from the school. Note the school uniforms. I didn't see much evidence of uniforms in the north, but as soon as we crossed the DMZ, every single school kid I ever saw had on some kind of uniform. The blue pants and shirt you see here are very common, and most young boys in southern Vietnam wear something like that. Young girls tend to wear something similar until about high school age, at which time most wear a white Ao Dai. The red bandana is a communist thing that was added recently. The way Leah explained it is that the bandana is the kids way of showing their appreciation for the fine education the communists are giving them.

Ettienne in the front had a camera along and got photos of some of the things I missed. Some of them are on these pages.

Most of the infamous Highway One looks a lot like this, and for my trip this traffic was fairly typical. Sometimes it was heaver than here, and sometimes lighter but this is a good average. Traffic got gradually heavier as we got closer to Saigon. Where we went, the road was mostly either flat or had gently rolling hills a few hundred feet high or less. We shared the road with cars, trucks and busses but didn't really have any trouble with them. Some parts of the road were considerably worse than this, but we never really had any roads I'd call bad for more than a few km. All in all, I preferred riding on this road to riding on the highway in America or Australia.

A better look at the quality of the road. Now keep in mind, that this is the road from north to south. This is the best road in Vietnam, roughly the equivalent of an interstate in the U.S. Most of the road was in a bit better condition than this stretch. Notice also the "truck" off to my left. People in Vietnam haul all kinds of things on bicycles and moto-bikes. I was constantly amazed by what I saw being hauled that way. The two most extreme examples I can think of were both moto-bikes in relatively heavy traffic. In Hanoi I saw people hauling a substantial sized piece of glass, and in Saigon I saw a guy hauling about 40 gallons (150 liters) of gasoline in plastic jugs attached to the bike with rope.

This is a bunch of us at a temple in Hoi An. Hoi An was a nice town to visit. I would recommend it if you're a shopper, but there isn't all that much there to photograph.

Photo Courtesy Et Tienne