Well I’ve been moaned at enough so it’s my turn to do the blog…… woohoo!!
Chill out morning after yesterday’s epic adventure. The plan for today was to take it easy in the morning and head to the Phong Nha cave around lunch time.
As we finished breakfast – tremendous banana pancakes! We were just about to hire a scooter for the day when 2 guys were being treated for what looked like war wounds! They literally had just fell off the scooter outside the hostel. Since I would be the one doing the driving I made a quick U turn on the scooter so we settled for bicycles. Taking no chances out here.
As we arrived into town we were on the lookout for some long pants for the trekking here and in Borneo as elephant pants just weren’t cutting it. Also Becky was on the hunt for a jacket as she was “freezing”…….it’s actually quite cold, around 15 degrees.
As we stumbled across a small shop the woman was having none of my haggling skills as she wouldn’t budge from less than a million dong for three items of clothing! So we left. Lucky though as the only jacket they had in Becky’s size was bright yellow 😂
We waited for an American couple to join us on the tour ( you had to pay for the full boat so the more people the less it would cost) as it turned out when ended up with 12 on our boat. Don’t know what happened I went to the toilet and all of a sudden the boat is full. For some reason they insisted that everyone on the boat wore a life jacket, their health and safety is lax compared to home; they don’t seem to cater for kids, or credit how you wear it, as long as it’s on your body 😂
The Phong Nha cave is the oldest cave there and it was a good 20min boat journey away lucky the views were outstanding and we didn’t have to make small talk 😂
Inside the cave was unreal. So many different shapes formed by the limestone and the colours created from the minerals in the water……yes I did pay attention to the tour guide the day before! The boat took us inside for around 1km with the man at the front ROWING the boat through the cave. Take my hat off to him it looked like very hard work. As we headed back the boat stopped to let us off to walk around for a bit. Got a chance to get closer to the action. Fantastic. The pictures just don’t do it justice.
We decided once we got back to the ticket office to head back to the shop and just pay whatever the woman wanted as we needed the long pants.
After this was lunch in a very nice place called bamboo cafe. I decided on the usual tofu curry. Keeping it simple as usual! Becky had eggplant in lemongrass and garlic-also amazing!
Now for the best bit. I fancied a desert and on the menu there was an item which I had to get…..Penis Banana…..Becky thought it was a typo turns out it wasn’t. Classic. The waiter had a cheeky smile on his face when I ordered.
The cycle back to the hostel was rather quick as the rain was heading in and Becky needed to warm up asap!
The plan was to organise and sort out the next part of the journey. Ninh Binh and Catba Island. Becky fell asleep……typical!
After dinner a group of us decided to play some riddle games….great just what I need. First was the Spoon game. Haven’t a clue what was happening during the game apparently all you had to say was OK before you said the sentence. I lost patience very quickly, Becky was enjoying it though. Then came the actual riddles…..when is 99 greater than 100…..I couldn’t care by this point…..the answer….on a microwave as when you type 100 it’s only a minute so therefore 60 seconds…I won’t repeat on here what I said at that point.
Off to bed for a very exciting trip tomorrow…..the abandoned valley tour!
South East Asia 2019 