After nearly 9 hours of sleep - that massage must've helped, we woke to pouring rain. Apparently it had rained all night long. We met as usual for 7am breakfast at the hotel, which was inedible for my tastes and retired to the coffee bar by the riverside, to make a plan for the day. The rain was set to stay all day long, and it wasn't light drizzle.
Toby, determined to get a cup of tea with milk took our English Breakfast tea to the bar and using Google Translate, asked for 'hot water and milk'.
Out came some condensed milk
He tried again, pointing to the kettle and a mug.
Out came some UHT milk ready to be heated up.
Another attempt at google translate and pointing desperately at the hot water from the coffee machine, 2 steaming mugs of hot water and a jug of cold milk was produced. In went our tea bags and it really did taste delicious! Can't take an Englishman away from his morning cuppa😅
That escapade resulted in more selfies taken with the staff as there were now 5 white people drinking at the cafe, a sight to be seen, apparently. We also earnt a cup of their speciality salted coffee - basically coffee, condensed milk, salt and thick cream on the top - a bit like warm icecream. Interesting choice of morning drink.
A plan was made to stay at the hotel until 10am, get in the van, drive towards the next hotel (150k away), get out and ride if the weather improves, and if not, go out for a ride when we get there. We were pretty much all agreed that we'd like to do something today, and if its just a couple of soggy hours, we can put up with that!
After an hours drive, we got out and took our chances. We were lucky. The rain stopped and although we'd missed the first 35k or so, we managed a speedy 93k at an average of 28kph. Fast, quiet roads, flattish with a tailwind virtually the whole way - just a dream.
No Vietnamese lunch today as the weather was so uncertain we didn't want to stop whilst it was dry, for it to then start pouring down when we started again. So it was rolls, egg, tomatoes, peanut butter, banana and snacks at a local coffee shop with hammocks. Good enough.
We passed through tea plantations, eucalyptus, tapoica, banana and more rice fields. The countryside was very rural in this section; green and hilly, with tea being planted into terraces in the farmlands. Very lush and green, but no time for photos.
But time for a little 1k swim in the hotel pool. We stayed in an 'Eco Hotel' whatever that means in Vietnam. Its quiet, in the countryside and basic. The latter like many of them - seemlingly relics from the communist era.
No comments:
Post a Comment