The pursuit by Robert

Our last full day in Vietnam did not disappoint.  After a few café su nongs (Hot coffee with cream) we headed out of Saigon on our scooters.  We headed south with intentions of viewing the South China Sea.  The 33 mile drive to the coast does not sound like much but when your vehicle is a 50cc scooter and your travels include getting through Saigon traffic and taking a ferry across the Saigon River your travels can be difficult. We managed to make it all the way out of Saigon and onto the ferry without one beer stop.  But once off the ferry our quest for beer was inevitable.   Our short ride across the Saigon River is unlike any ferry ride I have ever taken.  The chocolate color of the Saigon River was accented with a large amount of green mangrove leaves floating in the river’s current.  The traffic rules that dominate the Saigon streets appear to be no different on the waterways.  With ships passing in close proximity to the ferry with little or no reverence to personal space it is very reminiscent to the streets of Saigon.  The ferry crossing was made memorable by the fact that we made our way past the barriers and up to the deck where the captain let all of us take a stint at the wheel.  And, just like navigating the streets, our ferry crossing was completed without incident, but with much anxiety.  

Once across we made the acquisition of beer our primary goal.  Accelerating down the roads at speeds that were not intended for our scooters we came upon the perfect spot.  We crossed a narrow man made dirt passage that brought us to our beer oasis that was elevated above the swap lands that surrounded it.  Once across we enjoyed our beers on hammocks that were suspended above the swap with only slits of bamboo below us.  We enjoyed only a few beers while a man and woman worked next to us vigorously plucking the feathers from a duck that I assumed was going to be on the night’s menu.  A small puppy, who was wandering the floors of the restaurant, became my new companion while I enjoyed lounging in my hammock.  We toasted our good fortune as we pondered how the day, that had just started, could get any better

. 

After our short stop we continued on to the town of Can Gio which is situated just past the exit of the Saigon River on the South China Sea.  We consulted our map and turned right off the main road to what, according to our map, looked like a road that paralleled the sea.  Once we ran out of road we discovered that the road on our map was in fact nothing more than a dirt path.  Undeterred by what some may have determined was an inadequate road we follow the road with the South China Sea on our right. 

Some of our greatest adventures have begun in the pursuit of beer.  

At this time it was determined that a beer was needed to adequately enjoy the views that the South China Sea had to offer and, since it had been fifteen miles since our last beer stop, we were thirsty.  As we traveled along the dirt path I noticed a hut to the left that had people inside sitting around a table that had a copious amount of beer cans littering their table.  Thinking it was a restaurant I waved down Keith and Scott and told them that I found a place that had beer.  What happened next could be deemed, without exaggeration, as one of the greatest moments of our trip.  We parked our scooters and realized that what we thought was a restaurant was actually someone’s house.  I use the term “house”, but most of my American friends would have trouble defining this place as a house.  This was a one room ten by fifteen foot wood structure.  We walked in the open door to discover nine guys surrounding a table with pots of crab and numerous beers on top of the table and remnants of both under the table littering the floor.  We were immediately welcomed in and seconds later cold beers occupied our hands.  We sat down with them as a pot of fresh baked clams made its way to the table.  It was quickly apparent that none of us could understand a word the other was saying, but that we all spoke the universal language of beer.  “Yo,Yo,Yo!”  Before we were able to finish the beer in our hand another one was on the table waiting to be opened and enjoyed with the pot of snails that suddenly appeared.  I enjoyed the clams and the crab but the snails, which I tried, were not my thing.  Despite the language barrier much laughter was shared by all.  I am not sure that we were laughing at the same jokes, but we were all laughing at the same time.  After our third beer it became obvious that this party had no end in sight.  If we so desired we could have imbibed until the water buffalos came home, (Oh, he was grazing just outside the door) or until we fell down, which every came first.  Showing some constraint, and not wanting to embarrass ourselves any further, we quickly finished our beer on hand and stood up to thank our hosts before another arrived.  Since we just barged in on the party, drank their beer, enjoyed their food and were so grateful for the experience, we attempted to give them some compensation.  We started to pull some dong out of our pockets and we were met with a universal “No,No,No.”.  Not wanting to offend any further we quickly put our dong away and graciously shook everyone’s hands before we retreated back onto our scooters. 

We rode down the dirt road a ways and stopped at a wall overlooking the South China Sea.  We all took a moment and reveled in the greatness of the moment that just happened.  This truly is a great country filled with great people. 

Posted by Robert the ferry boat captain

The teacher or the student? By Robert

Our hotel is just a block away from the Ben Thanh market.  The market, located in District 1, is an intense experience.  The main entrance is marked with a large bell tower but the large square structure, that covers many city blocks, can be accessed from any of the adjacent streets.  Once you are inside all your senses are inundated from every angle.  If you are claustrophobic, germaphobic , agoraphovic or an aphenphosmphobic (Fear of being touched) Ben Thanh market is not for you.  Inside is a maze of stalls where it appears that almost everything is available if you search or just ask.  While inside you are swarmed by vendors pitching their wares.  Your personal space is constantly attacked by aggressive vendors who will grab you by the arm and attempt to pull you in the direction of their stalls in an effort to extract as much of your dong as possible.

 

Here is where the art of negotiation is required to ensure that you don’t get fleeced and leave the market penniless (dongless).   In the market there are many vendors selling some of Vietnam’s finest coffee.  Weasel coffee is some of the most expensive, and most desired, coffee in Vietnam.  Weasel coffee is made by first having a weasel eat the coffee berries.  In the digestive tract the weasel’s proteolytic enzymes seep into the beans making shorter peptides and more free amino acids.   After passing  through a weasel’s intestines the beans are then defecated.  The beans are then gathered, thoroughly washed and then sun dried.  The result, although it sounds strange, is some great coffee.  (How do these people think of this stuff?)  Throughout our trip we would often order coffee which was served to us in cups with their own small coffee drippers mounted on top of the rim.  We would wait patiently, sometimes, as the thick coffee would slowly drip into our cups resulting in an amazing cup of coffee.  I really wanted a few of these and some coffee to bring home and in Ben Thanh Market they are readily available.  I walked around for a while asking multiple vendors their asking price for this item.  Once I found a reasonable starting price, the negotiations began.  The vendor I chose started his pitch by telling me that he was going to give me a kilo of his finest weasel coffee and four drippers for a discounted price of 400,000 dong ($20).  After telling him that his “discounted” price was still way too high, his price began to fall reaching 300,000 dong quickly.  Not good enough for me I told him, the price then dropped slowly to 250,000 dong.  Still not good enough, I made my offer.  “I will take four drippers and I.25 kilos of weasel coffee for 200,000 dong ($10).”  “No, no, no.  That is too cheap.”  He cried.  “I will sell you four drippers and one kilo of a lower grade coffee for 200,000 dong.”  He countered.  “No thank you.  I will find another coffee seller”, I replied and began to walk away.  As I turned the deal was made.   (I still think I paid too much.)

Elsewhere in the market you can find every souvenir that you can think of, and then some.  From t-shirts to Gucci knock offs to ivory inlaid chopsticks.  It is all there.  There is also a food court.  Not like your local shopping mall, this place is crazy and does not get any more authentic.  Your food is cooked right there in front of you sometimes before it stops squirming.  There are also few sections of the market that are dedicated to fresh foods, and I mean fresh.  I stopped to take a picture of a little old man who was cutting up some crab and a fish jumped out of a tub and landed at my feet.  A lady quickly scooped up the fish that was flopping at my feet and threw it back into the water filled bucket.  Live squid, sea snails, clams, crabs and a lot of other things that I have never seen before are available for sale.  Another isle is a vegetarians worst nightmare.  Meat is on display everywhere.  Cow brains, intestines, cow hearts, pig’s legs, pig heads and much more are all out there in the open air on display.  While the meat section maybe a vegetarian’s worst nightmare, the produce section would make them drool.  They sure do grow some weird stuff here, but it is tasty. 

After the morning in the market and a day filled with terrorizing the streets of Saigon, we decided to try to gain some good karma that may offset any of the bad that we may have achieved on the streets.  We went to a local school and taught an English class.  We, with the assistance of one of Keith’s friends, each took a class and spoke with them for an hour to help them with their conversational English.  My class began with them asking me many simple questions about myself and where I lived.  One of the students asked me about my house and if I had a car.  When I explained to him about how I lived back home he said, “So you are very rich.” I quickly replied, “I don’t think so.”  I then followed it up with, “I have traveled through many poor villages during my time in Vietnam.  Compared to them YOU are very rich.”  I also added, “You have made me much richer by allowing me to speak with you.  Cảm ơn.”  (Cảm ơn= thank you in vietnamese)  I hope that they gained as much from the class as I did. 

Posted by Robert the teacher and the student.

Cu Chi tunnels by Robert

It took us over an hour to go eight miles out of town and then another hour to go the final twenty two mile to our destination. (Of course we had to stop for beer)  The Cu Chi tunnels are an immense network of connecting underground tunnels located in the Cu’ Chi district of Saigon and are part of a much larger network of tunnels that underlie much of the country.  First started during the French war they were intensified and multiple layers were added during the Vietnam War.  Before you are allowed to go down into the tunnels you must first watch a very interesting propaganda video made in 1967 about the Cu’ Chi district, the American aggression and the tunnels that were used to fight off that aggression.  I only have two things to say about the video:  War is a terrible thing and there are two sides to every story. 

(Enough about politics)  I, all 6’ 1” of me, descended down into the tunnels by placing my hands above my head, the only way you can fit, and dropping into the entrance.  Once inside I scurried along a corridor that was maybe three and a half feet tall until I reached a room that was used to shoot at enemy combatants that were above ground.  The temperature today was in the 90’s with about 95% humidity.  Inside the tunnels it seemed at least ten degrees hotter.  I was soaking wet when I emerged from the tunnels.  What an experience.  I cannot imagine what it must have been like for the Vietnamese to fight from such a position or for American troops to go into these tunnels to flush out their enemy.  Very tight, dark and heavily booby trapped the tunnels must have been hell for both sides. 

Once we left the tunnels we found out just how fast a 50cc scooter can go.  With our heads down to reduce drag we accelerated to over 100km per hour.  That is only about 62 mph.  But on a scooter that feels like you are really moving.  We were able to make the return trip in about an hour and a half with no beer stops.  We did stop to cross a small wooden bridge on our scooters.  Once we got closer to the city we again hit rush hour traffic.  This experience boggles the mind.  We luckily found our way back to our hotel safely. 

After a shower at our hotel we headed out to dinner where we ate and attempted to tell some local women some jokes and, unsuccessfully from my perspective, explain to them why they were funny.  We did get a laugh out of them, but I am not sure if they were laughing with us or at us.  Either way we all laughed and had a great time.  Communicating with women is difficult without the language barrier.  Add the barrier and it is almost impossible. 

After dinner we cruised around town for a while on our scooters before stopping into another bar for yet another beer.  The Guns and Roses music emanating from the bar before we entered made me a little apprehensive, but once inside I got a great laugh.  In this bar, that sported a western theme, there was a center bar with waitresses dressed like cowgirls with their white daisy dukes, mid drift tops and a fake holster on their hip.  As if that was not entertaining enough, on stage was one of strangest bands I have seen doing 80’s rock cover tunes.  The cheesy Vietnamese lead singer was backed up by three Vietnamese women who could not properly pronounce all the lyrics and guitar players that looked like they stole all their moves from Mtv in the 80’s.  After a few songs which included: Pink Floyd, Bon Jovi and yet another GNR song we had to leave.  Vietnam is all about the experience. 

Posted by Robert the tall man who survived the Cu’ Chi tunnels and a cowboy bar in Vietnam.  

Insanity. by Robert

Albert Einstein is famously quoted as saying that insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.   If old Albert would have traveled to Saigon and witnessed rush hour traffic from a scooter he may have formulated another definition of insanity.  Melville and Hemingway put together would have trouble portraying the madness of such an event.  This is one thing that truly must be witnessed firsthand.  There are 7.4 million people in Saigon and I swear every one of them is on the road at the same time.  It is not just the mass of people that is overwhelming; it is also the way that they interact.  Imagine a thousand people on scooters and a light turns red.  Once everyone has piled in as tight as they can then the people in the back start using the sidewalks and the left lanes to get to the front of the line.  Before the light turns green there is a sea of scooter waiting to explode once the light turns.  When the light does turn green people go in all directions.  People going left go through people going straight without stopping.  There is no such thing as a left turn arrow or yielding to oncoming traffic.  People coming off the sidewalk will go straight through the intersection as people who stopped in the street go right.  The people who moved all the way over into the left lanes when the light turned red, now are going straight into oncoming traffic until they can merge to the right to go with the flow of traffic.  That is just the way they interact at traffic lights.  You would not believe the roundabouts.  Double WOW!

Being immersed in this chaos mounted on a scooter is truly an experience.  Let’s say you are on a side street with no lights and you want to turn left across a never ending stream of scooters.  In the United States we would sit there for a few minutes hoping for an opening and if one did not materialize we would turn right and drive until we could make a u-turn or another maneuver that would enable us to get the direction we wanted to go.  Not here.  An endless stream of traffic?  No problem.  Just drive right into the middle and make your turn.  It is unbelievable.  I am left nonplus by how so many people can fit on a road elbow to elbow and very rarely make any contact.   Let’s say you wanted to go left at a light but you are in the right lane.  This is also not a problem.  Just do it.  You drive past your turn.  Just drive on the sidewalk and go back.  There seem to be very little rules and it seems to work.  How it works?  I don’t know.  In the United States people would be yelling at each other, flipping people off, getting into fights or at least wagging their finger at you, not here.  People just keep their eyes pointed straight ahead, their feet on the brakes and their demeanor at an even keel. 

Today Keith and Scott took me you the war remnants museum.  They had been there before so I went in and walked around while they went off exploring for an hour.  While they had been there before they had a lot of trouble finding the place.  We drove around in circles stopping to ask for direction multiple times until we finally found the correct street.  On the way there I got a little bored and decided to get Keith back for a trick he played on me earlier in the week.  Early on in our trip we would joke with each other by riding along side of the other person and hitting their kill switch which is mounted right next to the throttle.  Keith, one day while I was doing forty miles an hour, leaned over, turned off my bike and pulled the key out of the ignition and drove off with my key.  With my engine turned off I pulled in my clutch lever and coasted until I caught up with Keith who slowed down to let me catch up.  I took the key from him and put it back in the bike without stopping.  Payback is a bitch.  While Keith was driving through traffic I turned off his scooter and removed the key.  Instead of being nice and returning his key in the manner he had done earlier in the week.  I turned back to see him slowing coming to a halt and I threw his key up in the air as I sped away.  Leaving him to park his bike in the middle of traffic and then retrieve his key.  Maybe you just had to be there, but we all laugh our ass off.  Score one for the newbie. 

One other cool thing we did on scooters today.  We drove right through a narrow market place today. Right past the fruits and vegetables. Right past the lady with the un-refrigerated meat of a table. We only stopped when a headless skinned frog landed at Scott's feet after it jumped away from the live flopping fish that were also on the table from which it took its leap. The funny thing is that no one even looked at us funny for driving through a narrow crowded market place. 

The fun you can have with scooters and they are only costing us $7.50 a day.

 

Posted by Robert.  The one swimming is the sea of insanity and loving it. 

Safely into Ho Chi Minh City. By Robert

We left the cool spring like temperatures of Dalat and continued heading further south where temperatures began to rise.  Once we were down the twisty mountain road the road became straight and congested.  The hard part about driving in Vietnam is that you rarely have a chance to relax.  At home you get in your car, grab a latte’, cruise through town and you feel safe that people are going to respect your space.  You rarely have to worry about spilling you latte’ much less about dying because a bus, tractor or cow is going to breach your lane.  As I was driving I realized that even when I hugged the far right side of the road, that is less than one foot of the road, I was still in danger of traffic coming the other direction.   On the road vehicles will use every inch of the road if it was available without concern for which direction they were headed.  Pulling far to the right just gives the buses more room for them to pass or avoid obstacles.  Stay on your toes. 

Today there did not seem to be much difference in the towns we rode through but the traffic seemed to be a little more aggressive than what we had previously witnessed.  There seemed to be a different vibe about today’s traffic.  A few strange moves by drivers and a bus that came less than an inch from my bike made us call out to each other, “Be careful today guys.”  Our premonition was unfortunately proven accurate when Scott, trying to navigate around a tractor, was clipped doing about 30 mph.   I watched as Scott attempted to pass the tractor that was going in the same direction.   He began his pass and the tractor started to slowly move to the left pushing Scott further and further over.  I thought that he would have no problem making the pass when the tractor all of a sudden turned left into him as he was almost passed.    The tractor hit him square on his foot and the back half of his bike lifting the back half of the bike off the ground.  How Scott managed to keep control of the bike and not go down is a mystery to me.  The bike seemed to survive without a scratch, but Scott’s foot appears to have incurred some damage that has left him with a slight limp.  Thankfully, I am sure Scott’s injury will be temporary while the experience will live on. 

Our bikes limped into Ho Chi Minh City (HCMC).  Bald tires, blown fork seals, broken levers and a broken clutch cable did not prevent us from completing our journey from North to South.  We dropped off our big bikes and are now going to start our adventures on scooters.  This is going to be much more difficult.  Being on big bikes you have the power, and the respect, to get through traffic.  On scooters we will be, although much taller than everyone else, their equal. 

HCMC has many more tourist than anywhere else we have been.  Last night we walked the streets and markets and discovered an amazing place for dinner that was minus any white faces.  This place, that was off the beaten path, was packed with locals.  We had some delicious food that included chicken with wild mushrooms and ginger.    A ton of food with a few beers mixed in and our total bill was about $3.50 each. 

Posted by Robert the one who didn’t get hit by a tractor or hit a cow.  

Blown seal, flat tire, check engine light on and a lake in the middle of the road. by Robert

For the last few days we have been relying less and less on Ngoc for directions and relying more and more on Keith’s Gps on his phone that he has mounted to his handle bars.  We often come to an intersection where Scott and I cry, “Which way Keith?” through our headsets.  This is not like the Gps in my car that tells me prior to my turns which direction I will have to go and then yells at me “recalculating” each time I make a wrong turn.  This is a small little map on a very small screen that shows us where we are.  We often have to drive down a road and then recheck the map to make sure we are on the right trail and then turn around if we are wrong.  Keith does all this through heavy traffic, sometimes with no hands. 

Today we passed through an intersection and our map told us we were on the right road.  I, as I rarely do, took the lead.  First, let me tell you why I ride in the back so often.  Riding in the back gives me the added plus of watching how the other two guys navigate the obstacles ahead.  The person in the front will call out obstacles and road conditions to the guys that are following.  “Bumpy road.” “Cow!” “BUS!” “Kids.” etc. When riding twisty roads, or passing large vehicles, the person in front will let us know if it is safe, “Clear.”  I am also riding in the back often because I am the slowest, but I have to stay close enough or the headsets will stop working because of lack of range.   So, this time I took the lead.  The corners were clean and fast.  I am starting to get into a zone linking corners and having a great time.  I do my usual on these tight corners, brake into the corner, down shift, lay it into the corner and accelerate out hard.  I am accelerating hard out of the corner and “WOOOOOOOH!”  hard on the brakes.  Someone put a lake in the middle of our road.  Keith and Scott almost piled into me as I came to a complete stop before the large body of water.  We checked the map and it said we were on the right road.  The paved road went directly into the water.  The power lines, that were following the road, were submerged all but the last few feet leaving the cable dry.  A dirt road to the left looked a good alternative.  It appeared to go up and follow along the road that was submerged.  So up we went following with the lake on our right until the “road” came to an end.  We were forced to turned around and went back to the paved road.  We checked the map and Keith said, “This is the right road.”  So we tried the dirt road on the other side of the lake hoping for a reconnection to our paved road.  First I had to put down a board so we, Scott and I (Keith pushed his bike through without), could get over some deep water.  I put the board down and Scott rode around so that he could get a straight shot on the board while Keith stood on the other side waiting to get a photo.  Bam! Scott is down, again.  As he was lining up for the board he hit some slick mud and went down as Keith captured it all with the camera.  While Scott picked up his bike, I rode over the very flimsy board and almost went down on the crossing.  (All captured by Keith)  Once all of us were across we followed the dirt road through trees and mud only to discover another dead end.  Back to the paved road we went and then on to the last intersection we passed.   We consulted the map to find another road, one without a lake in the middle, that would get us to where we needed to go. 

We rode for a while and found the bridge that crossed over our road consuming lake.  We stopped to watch some kids jumping off the bridge and briefly entertained the thought of stripping down and joining them.  The brown water persuaded us to instead stick with taking pictures.  There were floating houses that were only accessible by boat with children playing inside that made for some good photo opportunities. 

We stopped for lunch and discovered that Keith’s bike was losing all the oil out of his front right fork.  While we were inspecting the oil that was draining past the seal and all over Keith’s front rim and tire, I chimed in with what I thought would be the joke of the day.  “We are now going to call Keith the gay walrus.” I stated.  My travel mates looked at me confused until I followed up with, “Ya, he just blew a seal.”  We all laughed and continued calling Keith the walrus for the next few miles.  My joke would have been considered the funniest of the day if not for Scott yelling out a few miles later, “Stop! I have a yellow check engine light on.”  Both Keith and I are thinking, “these bikes don’t have check engine lights.”  Scott immediately followed sheepishly, “Oh, that is just my indicator light.”  We were laughing so hard we had to stop to wipe the tears from our eyes and, of course, have a beer to continue to revel in Scott’s humor.   For the rest of the day, “We have to stop! I have a blue light on.” I would say.  “Oh, it is only my high beam light.”  Laughter! 

Another nail in Keith’s tire, his third, resulted in an unexpected beer stop while people down the road fixed his flat tire.  This lady saw us coming.  Beer which is usually 20,000 dong each, was being charged to us at a rate of 33,000 dong each.  This did not deter us from our consumption.  Once the tire was fixed we set off again.

A few miles before we got to Da Lat Scott and Keith were doing their usual racing through the corners while Scott filmed Keith with his GoPro.  I, being behind again, watched and listened.  I lost site of them and only listened as Keith and Scott cheered.  I came around the corner to discover Keith down on the side of the road.  I later watched the video of Scott and Keith racing through the corners which showed Keith sliding out on a corner only to be narrowly missed by a tour bus coming from the other direction.  Keith, Scott and I watched the video over and over again in our hotel room cheering every time, toasting to the fact that we all made it through the day safely. 

Posted by Robert.  The man with the second best joke of the day and still the last man standing.  

Recounting the day

So here we are.....actually I don't know where here actually is, but here had beer.

Today robot had his turn at a cow.....really, really close. I almost hit a guy with a kid on his shoulder.

He walked right out into traffic with out even looking. Scott goes down again (he calls it a tip over) and we found new obstacles to try and avoid. We found trees, water and mud. The video should be good. The route we followed ended at water with all 3 of us racing for the lead. The road curved around a blind corner an dove straight under the water with two dirt trails leading off both directions around the huge body of water. We tried really hard to find our way around but never succeeded. Great video though.

Currently we are sitting on a gravel side road with another flat tire....all of our tools are with Ngoc our fearless guide. He is about 20 miles away, waiting at our hotel. The good news is we found cold beer. Probability our most expensive stop in Vietnam. The total bill was $20 usd only 1.50 was for the flat tire, the rest was beer. You probably need a perspective for this $20....our total food,hotel and beer bill for the last 8 days has been $350...half of that was just beer. The guys were picking on me for the second nail in my bald tire...only because of the bar bill.

We figured we were not far from our hotel ....what can go wrong from here.....I guess we forgot to post the condition of our bikes..Scotts back tire has been bald for several days...I blew a seal (front fork)....thus the new nick name the gay walrus...and both tires are shot on my bike. I have been trying to trade bikes with Roger (robots new nick name)....but he refuses. By the way he almost went down..even if the picture doesnt get posted...we know.

Shortly down the road...Chubby's yells through headset I have a yellow light flashing....we were all thinking .....not now. Robot and I are looking at our dashes, because nothing has worked the entire time we have had these bikes. Check engine light...these bike are old and there is no such thing. What is he babbling on about....then the it hits us...his turn signal was on.....oh my we all most fell over riding our bikes we were laughing so hard.....I have not seen that light the entire trip so it scared me said Scott....Robert and I were in tears...we have to pull over and rest a second....let's help him turn off his flasher.

So we hit he road..not a great path, but not far to go...thinking the gods are with us.... chubby films the descent in to Da Lat....not all goes well...you will have to watch the video to find out what happens...I will know who watches...

The score....Scott and I down twice...Robert still standing

Posted by Keith the gay walrus..