Day 7: Dong Van to Bac Me

We were randomly woken again today by Radio Vietnam - this time at 05:00 in the morning. Or, at least, I was - I swear Ryan could sleep through an earthquake. There was no fresh bread in the town, so we had pancakes for breakfast instead (can't say I was too disappointed about that...)

Today was a rolling ride through the same spectacular mountains - prefaced by our guide telling us the big climbs for the day would be 2, 3, 4 and 5km.

The scenery along this part of the trip was amazing. We had been riding under grey skies the entire trip - today was more of the same, and the peaks of the mountains were shrouded in clouds. Despite there being a massive and steep drop-off from the side of the road, it was not uncommon to see people working on the mountainsides. Their children would often be on the roadside above and we got lots of smiles and "hellos" as we passed. It was also possible to play "spot the buffalo" - all the buffalo wore bells around their necks, and even in what would seem to be the most isolated spots, we could usually still hear the soft notes of buffalo bells echoing up from the valleys.

You can see our road halfway up the mountainside

We had another picnic lunch from the van, which we ate under the front porch of the local school teacher in one small village. He also, somewhat disconcertingly, had a pool table under his front porch. In fact, we ended up seeing quite a few pool tables, but always outside (I guess the space inside is too precious to waste on such a thing).

The last leg of the ride took us out of the big mountains and back into terraced valleys. There were houses on every corner of the road (taking advantage of the flat ground) and lots more kids to wave to. It was, however, becoming a bit of a challenge to wave a cheerful hello back without looking too exhausted.

We were supposed to stay that night in a government hotel, but it was under repair, so instead we were put up in a family-run guesthouse. Our guide regaled us with stories of rats and cockroaches in the government place, so we were more than happy with the alternative arrangement. Our room boasted the most tiny bathroom yet - with the shower coming directly from the sink and hooked into the non-existent space between the sink and toilet. At least we were used to it by now.

We still had dinner at the government hotel. I'm happy to report that the only wildlife we shared it with was one vocal cat.

Our guesthouse - one room wide

Try not getting the toilet wet in this one...