Bike riding through Vietnam

The last time I rode a bike I was on holiday.  It was Lord Howe Island where bikes are the predominant form of transport - it was also 1997.  This did not stop me today climbing on a mountain bike to head off through the Vietnamese countryside.

The journey began early, at 7.30 when we met our tour guide for the next few days (other than tomorrow) Fu - phonetic spelling, I've got no idea of the actual spelling.  We took a 1.5 hour bus ride out of the city on very modern highways and bridges which Fu explained the Government is building to try to keep up with the growth of HCMC and Vietnam in general.  It was an interesting ride learning all sorts of things like they manage to get 3 rice harvests annually in the Meekong Delta and tidbits about the way of life.

The team about 10km into the ride and ready to cross the river

We arrived and I watched with trepidation as the bikes were offloaded from a boat, would I remember how to ride?  As it turns out the answer is yes, but I must admit I would have preferred to practice on some nice flat footpath, not a potholed road which is also home to cars, trucks, numerous scooters including ones with considerable trailers.  There were several times as we were buzzed by much larger vehicles that I thanked the crew for yesterday lighting some incense at the pagoda for us to have safe journeys.  It had also been a long time on a bike for Jules and Rob, so the three of us progressed during the day from some serious wobbles to reasonable competence.

Mikey loves durian!

We made plenty of interesting stops along the way.  We ate fruit of many varieties including jack fruit, durian, dragon fruit and tiny bananas.  We drank sugar cane juice and copious amounts of water because it was really hot and extremely humid.  All of us were dripping with sweat - well not us girls but we were "glowing" furiously.

Sugarcane juice

At the sugar cane stop we were taking a rest in the shade when they decided to do a bit of cock fighting practice for our amusement.  It isn't very amusing to see the cocks going for each other, but at least it was only practice so they didn't have the metal spurs on.  Cock fighting seems to be the national pastime.  In every village and at almost every house there was at least one cage containing a fighting cock.  Being the countryside there were also plenty of chickens just roaming around along with dogs and cows.  We saw horses pulling carts, a trailer full of pigs and at least one cat haunting the shadows.

We also came across people husking coconuts.  They do it by impaling the coconut on a sharp metal blade.  Seeing this Oren and Mikey decided to have a go.  I had visions of them impaling themselves, but they managed it eventually and now have massive respect for the guy who does 1,200 per day.

Many of the places we stopped or just rode through we became the attraction.  Very few white tourists apparently do this tour, so seeing a big group of very white (well actually very red and sweaty) people was a real novelty.  Fu also told us that the paragon of beauty was apparently white skin and a long nose - who knew!

Megs makes a new friend

At one point we had to take a ferry over the Meekong to continue on our journey and I did wonder how we would get back, as it turned out it was by joining the highway and riding over a massive bridge.  The final trip down the highway with traffic roaring past was - for me at least - somewhat terrifying.

But we all made it the 25km.  Rob had a dodgy bike which had its brakes break, then lock up, so he was particularly done in, but it was a sore and sorry lot that made it back for lunch.

Almost there, the 25km mark

However lunch was worth it.  They served us fresh spring rolls made with elephant ear fish, fresh rice noodles and basil in front of us.  We had deep fried spring rolls, prawns, a Singapore noodle type dish, a fried rice type dish and a soup.  It was brilliant.

At that point we hauled our weary (and sore) arses back on the bus and into the city for some much needed showers.

Since then everyone has managed to get a massage, Petra, Mikey and Rob have squeezed in two!  Everyone except Oren went to the Sheriton hotel for drinks in the bar on the 23rd floor  This is a must do for tourists in HCMC as the views are spectacular and amazingly the cocktails are still less than Australian prices, although significantly more than you would pay elsewhere.

We headed to dinner at the night market, fantastic again then headed in directions of shopping and massages.  It has been an epic day.

Our table at the night market was behind the "kitchen" it was great seeing how the magic happens