Day 1: Cycled 75km, Mui Ne to Gia Bac, altitude 800m.
Day 2: Cycled 68km, Gia Bac to Ninh Gia, altitude 900m, peaked 1200m.
Day 3: Cycled 45km, Ninh Gia to Da Lat, altitude 1500m.
Day 4: Cycled 110km, Da Lat to Phan Rang, altitude 0m, peaked 1600m twice.
Link to photograph album.
Link to results in Vietnamese.
Day 1: Wrong
A day where almost everything that could go wrong went wrong.
We started our cycling tour in Mui Ne instead of the planned Ma Lam. This was because trains from Saigon only stopped at Ma Lam on weekends. Eric, my Spanish cycling companion and friend, arranged for a 4-hour bus ride to beach resort town of Mui Ne instead, 40km away from our original start point (we thought it was only 10-15km). The first 20km or so along the coastal road was to get Phan Thiet. From that point on we headed inland cruising mostly on flat terrain flanked by rice fields for the next 30km.
Ma Lam turned out to be our sugar cane juice stop about 2 hours after we started cycling. Sugar cane juice here with a lighter orange colour doesn’t taste like the dark green ones in Malaysia. I think I read some where that they add a tinge of tangerine so it taste like orange juice. Still very nice.
An hour or two later, the much anticipated climb begins. We ate some some energy bars and Vietnamese candy to start off as it was nearly lunch time. A milestone showed that Gia Bac was about 25km away so we planned to have lunch there. Little did we know that Gia Bac was the top of the climb and that there were no towns or shops in between for supplies.
We climbed at a good steady pace at first, maybe for an hour or so. But as the road became narrower and some steep sections of 10% gradient began to emerge, I started to lag behind Eric. When faced with another steep section, I got off my bicycle and began to push it uphill. Cramps from the ‘hiking’ began to set in my legs so we took more rest stops for me to recover. Water soon ran out and we still didn’t know how far to the top of the climb. All we remembered from Google Maps was that there was going to be a peak, then a downhill. We were both hoping that the top of the climb would come soon and that Gia Bac was in a valley so we could glide downhill. Wrong.
As we were passing a stopped lorry, Eric asked the driver and his group of friends for some water and how much further to the top of the climb. As we sipped some cool green tea, they told us “three more kilometres to the top.” With some renewed confidence I declined their offer to drive us to the top or even to Di Linh, our scheduled stop for that night. Wrong again.
About 1.5km into our “three more kilometres to the top”, a man on motorbike on his was down in the opposite direction. He told us we had another SEVEN kilometres to go to the Gia Bac, the top of the climb. My heart sank into my empty stomach. With his decent grasp of Vietnamese, quick-thinking Eric negotiated with the man to take him up to Gia Bac to get food and water while I waited with our bicycles.
45 minutes later, Eric returned with a bunch of bananas, a small water melon, water, orange juice, and a Red Bull. We were joking that Red Bull will now give us “wings”. He also managed to arrange for a place to stay for the night since it was going to get dark soon, dark clouds were beginning to gather and thunder didn’t seem to sound from far.
From Eric’s description of the remaining terrain, boosted by bananas and Red Bull wings, we set off again confident of completing the rest of the climb. Rain soon poured on the first of two remaining climbs which I was lagging behind again. But when I did get close enough to him, I noticed his rear wheel was almost punctured. It seemed this wheel had been suffering a slow puncture all day.
Earlier in the day, he realised that he had forgotten to bring the spare tubes he had bought for the trip. He asked if I had brought my “repair kit”, thinking he was referring to my bicycle “tool kit”, which I replied yes. We decided we would buy a spare tube if we came across a bicycle shop along the way during the day, which we didn’t. Otherwise, he was going to rely on what he thought was my “tube puncture repair kit”, which I didn’t have. Wrong again.
When we realised our miscommunication, it was dangerous for him to cycle downhill so we got off our bikes to “hike” downhill with our bikes. This time I suffered a new type of cramp for the day. But at least his rear wheel seemed better when it did not have to support his weight. He inflated his tyre with the hand-pump that I kept in my bag. But this time, it was my turn to unknowingly leave behind a customised elastic strap which came together with my neighbour’s rear rack.
A dropped chain and a final push to the top later, we released a sigh of relief as we gained sight of the village of Gia Bac, after cycling 75km up to 800m altitude. It was nearly six in the evening and the sun was already setting. We soon arrived at the shop where we were going to spend the night in. As I began to unpack, I realised the customised elastic band was missing and resolved to find it in the morning.
The shop was a sundry shop/cafe/restaurant/owner’s home, probably even a zoo if we included the pet monkey. It wasn’t a motel until we arrived that day. The boss’s youngest son gave up his double-bed for us to sleep that night but we had to share the large room with his teenage sister and the pet monkey. Mosquito nets helped kept us out of view that night I think but not the music. More on that later.
After a change to dryer clothes, I was now ready for my first taste of pho (pronunciation), Vietnamese beef noodles. Not as strange as I thought it would be because I left out some of the strange leaves they usually have. My stomach almost got upset but I guess the body signalled that it needed to replenish all the nutrients lost from the day’s ride, so there was no visit to the toilet that night for the wrong business.
After one cup of rice wine and some Chinese TV drama dubbed by a single Vietnamese voice, the boss ushered us to bed by 9 p.m. Her daughter was already in bed (no, we couldn’t see her through the dark green mosquito net, phew) listening to a small looping selection of music which included the annoying Barbie Girl song by Aqua (after Googling the title). I only heard that song twice before I arrived at La La Land, but Eric had to endure it 5-6 times before the music stopped at about midnight.
Day 2: Right
In contrast to Day 1, almost everything that could go right went right.
By six o’clock in the morning, it was already bright. Breakfast was pho again, and I quietly resolved not to eat this for rest of the trip. When Eric asked the boss about his tyre puncture, he led us to the next house further down the road where his son ran motorcycle repair shop. It was obviously too early in the morning for his son but with his eyes half-opened, he found a very fine metal pin piercing through the tyre wall. He patched the rear tyre tube without even dislodging the rear wheel from the frame, something we’ve never seen done before but later figured out that this was conventional for motorcycles.
We then went back about 1km to where I thought I had left the rear rack’s elastic strap after retrieving the pump from my bag but spent the next half an hour fruitlessly shifting through dried grass. I gave up hope and as we headed back to the shop to collect our bags, I started to think how to break the news to my neighbour about the rack’s missing strap. But 100 metres on, there it was lying there on the road! This was the place where I fixed my dropped chain. Sigh… of relief.
Back to the shop for a circus-like performance, Eric wasn’t really himself yet, but after a strong cup of Vietnamese ice coffee we ready to set off. Getting all the way to Da Lat by the end of Day 2 as we originally planned never entered our minds. We seemed willing to put in whatever miles we could that day and sacrifice some part of our rest/sight-seeing on Day 3 in Da Lat to cycle the whole way. I myself had second thoughts and contemplated taking the easy way out and head back to where we came from. Maybe I was discouraged by yesterday, but seeing Eric leading in front on the 400-metre climb first thing in the morning was an encouragement to push on.
It also took a while for my legs to get warmed up but our steady pace soon got us to the 1200-metre pass. It was mostly downhill from there but not enough to get us to Di Linh just yet. The hills then began to roll past coffee plantations through a number of small villages. On one of the small climbs, we were joined by school girls who cycled with us. They were stringing questions in English for us to answer while Eric “entertained” them with his Vietnamese. We noticed that they always seemed to be travelling to and from school all day long, probably because of the morning and afternoon sessions and some lived far away from school.
Di Linh came our way just in time for us to have lunch there. The clouds gathered earlier than we expected (we knew this was rainy season) but we found a rice shop just before the heavy downpour began. The many dishes and unlimited amount of rice looked like the perfect cycle tourist’s diet which we didn’t have the day before. After the full meal, the rain stopped and we got on our bikes but we weren’t going to go further until we find out what was ahead of us at an internet shop. A gradual descent followed by another gradual climb within 40km, along with our estimated average speed and daylight hours available, seemed reasonable and would take us to an airport town where we thought there would be better chances of finding accommodation.
At Di Linh, we had just joined the main artery that linked bustling Saigon with Da Lat, probably a main route to transport supplies and agricultural produce. We were reminded of this fact as we negotiated the much heavier traffic and poor road surface conditions. These factors slowed us down significantly on the descent and we were getting weary from the gradual climbs.
As we rode into the small medium-sized town of Ninh Gia, Eric suggested that we start looking for a place to stay as our tired legs and the amount of remaining daylight discouraged us from continuing for another 10-15 km to the airport town. He stopped at a pharmacy to ask where was the next hotel. To our surprise, the man pointed to a green building no more than a few hundred metres away. We weren’t expecting much from a small town hotel but the receptionist spoke decent enough English, there was a garage to keep our bikes, a partially furnished but large room with 2 double beds (good for laying out stuff for re-packing) and there was cable TV in the room!
After cleaning tar and grime off ourselves and some TV, we went out hunting for dinner. We ended up in a simple but large restaurant with a large parking area and a large com and pho sign. It was fairly empty at first but trucks and lorries soon rolled in and the place quickly became busy. Turned out to be more of a drivers’ rest-stop for meals rather than a restaurant but we figured this probably meant cheap good food for us. Some customers had shared dishes with rice while another popular choice was thin steak with rice (looked really good). We couldn’t really understand the meals ordering concept so we went around tables to see what dishes looked appealing and ordered with rice, another satisfying meal like lunch in Di Linh.
Another HBO movie later, we concluded that this was definitely a day where almost everything that could go right went right. Although we only covered 68km (less than our target of 75km a day), we thought we didn’t leave too much to do on the third day.
Day 3: Push
A day for the 40km push to Da Lat.
We started our day shopping for some fruits and bread for breakfast and headed to a typical but quiet cafe where I had my first taste of Vietnamese coffee. The ratio was probably 3 parts coffee from a strainer, 2 parts sweetened creamer and some ice to water it down but it still packed a real punch. (I hear Coffee Island on Gurney Drive has this version).
We were on our way out of Ninh Gia but not without a slight drama. Just as Eric was about to put on his cycling shades, for the first time as his eyes were getting irritated, he noticed a little scorpion the size of peanut on the lens. As we tried to take pictures of the scorpion, local kids started gathering around us so we showed off our exotic creature to them before getting rid of it safely. The kids in return brought out their bald-headed crow to impress us.
There was only a slight climb over the next 30km and I think the roads conditions slowly improved as we got closer to the Da Lat. There was even one section of dedicated cyclist lane (for both motorised and no-motorised) next to a few kilometres of tolled-highway but our joy was short-lived as it only lasted for less than 10 minutes. Persimmon fruit sellers then started to line the road and we were forced to buy a whole kilogram even though we wanted less.
We could hear sounds of waterfalls nearby and decided to stop at the Prenn Falls. The park was a bit touristy but our highlights were the walk behind the waterfall and Eric’s amusing ostrich ride. The trainer only allowed three laps before forcing the ostrich into the corner for him to get off. (I think he’ll publish a YouTube video of it soon.) At least he didn’t have it as bad as the next guy when the trainer lost control of the ostrich which went a bit wild.
We were snacking at the park for the final 10-15km to Da Lat but some rain came early so we decided to have a proper lunch. The showers didn’t last very long but we had already ordered some stir-fried noodles. The noodles looked a bit bland at first but it tasted quite good with some fish sauce. The clouds however moved ahead of us carrying rain which would drench us later.
After lunch we left the park with confidence to face what was ahead of us although I didn’t know much too much about the last miles. I’ll never be able to decide whether not knowing is better than knowing because the last stretch was almost constant climb for over 2 hours. We unknowingly took what was probably the longer, winding, but less steep, less traffic-busy route up to Da Lat, one that Eric didn’t recognise from his first trip up to Da Lat last year. And the downpour for the better part of this climb added to the struggle but somehow made the arrival at the summit entering into Da Lat so much more satisfying.
We made our way down town to our preferred budget hotel, even found out it had sauna in the main branch, but our favoured type of room were fully booked. We were then told of another owned by a family member, Thien An Hotel, which had vacancy at the same price but no sauna. The room for two, free use of computers with internet, free use of bicycles (if we needed) and ‘buffet’ breakfast for two, all for US$20 was the final step up in the improvement of accommodation standard progressed from a village home-stay and a town’s only hotel.
With enough time to sight-see only one tourist attraction, we rented a motorbike and headed to another hotel-in-the-making but more commonly known as the Crazy House. Not exactly a chip of Antoni Gaudi’s block in La Sagrada Familia, maybe only just as eccentric. Her design, especially those already constructed, seemed very random. The rooms-for-rent were themed by different animal creatures but a red-light-eye tiger or bear in the room with uncomfortable beds would not justify the prices for a long stay. Although the site’s construction began in 1990, the lobby had some work left to do and there are 2 large building sections targeted to be complete by 2011 (or was it 2013?).
We still had time for a massage, thinking it would be good for tired legs (not really), but it turned out the arms felt best after it. My left hand’s ring finger nerves had been tingling occasionally after the first day, it didn’t go away until a week later. I also could not rest my weight on my palm upon any edge which would resemble a bicycle handle for a week. But dinner at HNL Restaurant and some time on the computer checking the route and terrain of next day’s final ride was at least enough to send me to bed in the cool temperatures of Da Lat.
Day 4: Hard
Hard was something we did not expect from a day which had a 1600-metre descent.
There was only one objective for the day: cycle over 80km to Thap Cham to catch 2:46pm train to Saigon. Just keep in mind that both these numbers were from the internet.
The day started early with the much anticipated breakfast. Most of the reviews of Dreams 1, Dreams 2 and Thien An hotels raved about the breakfast provided, justifying its top three spots on the TripAdvisor rankings. They provided bread, butter, peanut butter, marmite, jam, cheese, dragon fruit, banana, mango, watermelon, pineapple, eggs, bacon, yoghurt, orange juice, coffee and tea. This amount of food available reminded me of some great hostels in Europe.
I stuffed myself in anticipation of two climbs, both would peak at 1600m, with a little dip in between. We got straight to work climbing out of Da Lat in excellent morning weather. Passed some large French-built mansions and later smaller bungalows, road conditions slowly deteriorated but it was not as busy as we expected it to be. The first climb was fairly easy, the second was longer although I remembered it as being more pleasant through some coniferous forest. We had probably covered 15-20km by the end of the second climb.
After that came the reward that we had been working for the last 3 days and one morning: DOWNHILL!!!
Our descent from the highest point came in two parts. The first was an estimated 600-metre descent over 6km, when translated to 10% average gradient, sounds more scary than fun. The second was another 800-metre drop in elevation within about 14km (5-6% average gradient). The bumpy ride down made me thankful that Eric borrowed for me a dual-suspension mountain bike with cantilever brakes. I would have had multiple pinch-flats/tyre-punctures or fallen off cliffs if I had ridden my own road bike over those road surfaces.
There was glaring difference in confidence between me and Eric when it came to descending on two wheels. As I used a lot of my brakes to keep my speed under control, he was about 5 minutes ahead of me at one point (inclusive of my bio-break). His weight, semi-slick tyres, and more importantly, his Basque-origin probably helped too. But views from a bicycle slowly going downhill, wind in the face, and pedals and cranks spinning effortlessly, no matter how short-lived those moments were, were things that made all the hard climbing and the overall trip worthwhile. So far.
At the bottom of the descent, after a sugar cane drink and a picture of a lion dance boy, about 55km laid ahead of us. We were no longer in the comforts of cool temperatures and there were no clouds in the sky for shade. We stopped after an hour averaging about 25km/h for some relief from the sun and a quick lunch. With the remaining distance about 30km to cover within 2 hours, a reasonable average speed of 20km/h would have taken us to the train station with time to spare.
The hard grind for me began here. The fourth consecutive day of loaded cycling, climbs, more than 250km, heat and then finally compounded by head winds as we approached the coast was the last straw that broke my back. I struggled to keep up with Eric as on the first day. My jaw dropped to take in as much air as possible, so much so that even my lower lips were inflamed by the end of the day from sun burn. Even Eric’s responses to kids’ calls of ‘hello’ grew faint with boredom (after three days of enthusiastic HELLO!) and need of breath. When cramps were creeping into my legs, I switched to a lighter gear to keep the legs spinning and stayed on the bike. The kilometre markers to our destination passed so slowly that I dare not check what time it was for fear realising that we might be in danger missing the train. That would have knocked the wind out of me so I kept to just counting down the miles instead of the minutes.
I continued to cycle at Eric’s insistence as he stopped to get both of us a final glucose rush from sugar cane. After he caught up, his increased pace showed that he was well aware of the time but he probably didn’t want to put extra pressure on me. I managed to keep up closely behind him in his draft as he pulled our two-man peloton hard. The last kilometre finally arrived and we were soon on the look out for the rail road track that we had to pass before a left turn into the railway station.
Found it! I took out my phone to check the time: 2:30pm!
Phew! We made it, that was close!
Alas, after checking at the ticket counter and the time table, the train for Saigon had already left at 2:16pm. According the train times updated in August, we were 14 minutes late instead of 16 minutes early (according to the official website’s February schedule). We would have had to wait for another 6 hours for the 6-hour train ride after over 100km on a bicycle seat.
Eric’s quick thinking managed to get help from a young man who was just about to leave the train station to get to the bus station in Phan Rang. He and his girlfriend had probably missed the Saigon train too. It meant another 7 kilometres of cycling but at least it was at our own pace. The girlfriend wearing a bright orange jacket riding on a motorcycle taxi was kind enough to stop periodically for us bicycles to spot and catch up as they led us first to a bus station and later to a main road to hitch a bus ride. When a bus did stop, Eric still had to convince the bus driver to let us board with our bicycles but his grasp of Vietnamese got us through once again. We were finally on our way back to Saigon, enduring the 7-hour bus ride.
Even in Saigon, it was not without a little drama. We arrived past 11pm and Eric wasn’t sure how to get home from the bus station we had just arrived in until he asked for directions. Along the way, an elastic strap from my neighbour’s panniers snapped when it got caught by the wheel spoke and tied up the rear gear cassette. Sorry, Robert. I had forgotten to latch it back after re-assembling the bike at the bus station.
It took me a few long minutes and some tools to untangle the strap from the cassette at the time when we were still not sure of our location. But once free and on our way again, Eric soon spotted familiar surroundings and we were soon on the road that even I had walked along on the day of sight-seeing Saigon before we began our cycling journey. Eric’s girlfriend, Vanessa, who had been waiting at his house, could see fatigue written all over our faces when we arrived. I had already decided not to go to Cu Chi tunnels 60km away to spare my lower body of probably some underground tunnel-crawling and another return bus ride.
A quick shower later and small snack, I repacked all my bike stuff into my backpack with mixed feelings. There was a slight sense of accomplishment but it was overshadowed by my under-estimation of the first day’s climb, the longer route leading up to Da Lat on the third day, and this final day’s missing of the train.
But I am now thankful for God’s providence, protection, mercy and grace in many forms during the trip, including Eric especially, Vanessa, kind Vietnamese people who helped us along the way, the weather, the terrain, the traffic, the shelters, food and water. I would now prefer to say God helped us conquer Da Lat.
Link to photograph album.
Link to results in Vietnamese.
Heh! Syok. Mount Kinabalu .. no problem le.