My memories of this place are kind of bittersweet. Sometimes you arrive to a place, and it feels like nothing. You are just a stranger passing by, you know it, and the city, with its own rhythm and style, also knows it. You do not attach too much to each other, and you leave, bringing only warm memories of the time you had there.

But sometimes, it hits you different. The moment you step your foot onto the busy street, you feel like it is yours. As if you have not just arrived, but spent a good chunk of your life on these streets, under these lanterns, and you have seen these small, ordinary houses millions of times, and know every scrap, every doorway there.

Hoi An was one of such places. Phong Nha is the other one.

-No, you cannot take the bicycle there, the road is very rough, and if the bicycle breaks, you will be stuck…

-But isn’t there a road? How to bikers drive there? I know they do.

No matter how I tried, the staff at the hotel was determined to NOT rent the bicycle to me, although I was sure it would do just fine (spoiler: it would have!).

Dark Cave involved ziplining, swimming, and intense cave exploration, so I do not have any pictures from there 😦 Getting to the cave is one hell of adventure itself. First you zipline 30 meters above ground, then you swim in the “blue lagoon” waters to the entrance, and then you walk (or should I say, crawl?) through dark cave lakes (I saw an albino eel :)), squeeze yourself through narrow tunnels and clay paths, and all this in a complete black-hole darkness, having only your filthy blinking light on a helmet, and the Pirates of The Caribbean soundtrack playing at the back of your mind. All this finally gets you to the mud baths (similar to Nha Trang baths, but should I even compare the two?). You turn off your helmet light, get your hands full of the poo-consistency clay, scream and throw these clayballs around, until you all look like as if a Chupacabra and a golem had a kid.

Because I am so amazing (honestly, just unsubscribe if you do not agree), I got invited to a beer party later that night, and after one beer we thought it would be a great idea to teach me how to drive a manual motorbike on a dark shady alley nearby. No helmets, no precautions, forget all that safety shit. I thought I released the clutch when I did not, and went a full wheelie for a couple of meters. I realized I am gonna crash into the fence, so the only way to stop the bike was causing the artificial fall, which I did, by steering the wheel to the right. No bikes were harmed in the process, & I flew sideways, scraping my jacket and my right palm as a souvenir. I had the audacity to still drive the bike back to the bar afterwards, but after that we finally called it a day, haha.

I also remember Phong Nha for finally allocating the money out of my budget for some treatments… Still amazes me how foot, head, full body massages, pedicures and manicures are all within 10-20CAD. We are being scammed, my friends, we are being scammed.

Last but not least, I took the boat 5 km up the river to see the Phong Nha cave. I should mention the amazing blue color the local waters have. Its a very bright blue with some green undertone, and its unreal to capture by camera, or to wrap your mind that it is even real at all.

The boat cost 550,000 dong (but we split it between 11 people), and the entrance was 150,000 for the Phong Nha Cave, and 80,000 dong to Tien Son Cave (Dry Cave).

The 360 video is here 1, 2 (voila, you now owe me 700,000 dong!).

I was unsure as to where or when the boat would be waiting for our group to get back, so I sticked to one of the couples from our group like a spy undercover. Turns out that neither did that couple know too, but it all became clear when one of Russians from the group came to get us. Oh, these accents, him telling us the boat is waiting sounded almost threatening, lmao.

We did not have to rush though, as we waited for another hour for the two French girls… Search parties were organized, and a random stranger could have assumed somebody got kidnapped by one of the dragons in the cave. I found the whole situation pretty funny, but I think I was the only ray of sunshine like that on our boat.

The next day I met another backpacker, Kristof, and finally started to overcome my fear to speak French (he was from France)… We had an amazing night bicycle ride, accompanied by cricket songs and warm, gentle splashes of the river. The highlight of the evening though, was when we stumbled across some 12 year olds, local Vietnamese kids, playing volleyball, and joined them in a match 🙂