Jeez, I can't believe it's been another week since I've updated. It's been a really great one for some serious learning and fun. From Nha Trang, "Vietnam's Beach", where I wrote from last time, I went to Dalat, a mountain town southwest of there that's supposed to remind folks of the Swiss Alps. I can't say I completely agree, but it was a pleasant couple of days and nights. Problem is, it's near the end of the dry season, and there are a lot of fires going on on the mountainsides ringing the town, so it's brown and smoky. Plus the large lake (reservoir) that's the focal point of Dalat, the apple of its eye, has been drained, and muck is being scooped out by large machinery.
But let me back up a little bit. When I got on the bus in Nha Trang, there was one other girl inside, and we just happened to be seatmates. So I met Ashleigh, another solo woman traveller, from Melbourne, and we ended up exploring Dalat and Saigon together the past five evenings. We rambled down and around Dalat's market and streets, including an old cobblestone lane lined with local street vendors selling sweets, shellfish, pho, etc. We tried bits of this and that, starting off with a kilo of dried yams! (half for Ashleigh and half for me, but I finished mine rather fast and Ashleigh gave me hers :).) I love dried yams. You can't find them like that, soft and chewy, without preservatives, in the States, not even at Trader Joe's. Many street vendors were selling three hot drinks, so I had to try them - soya milk, yellow bean, and peanut. Dalat was great for the street food and market. One night we had hot pot!
For a little something between the gastronomic explorations, I rented a mountain bike for 40K dong from a nice man who gave me a lock but no helmet. I was frankly a little nervous biking around with motorbikes and buses whizzing around, but I took a breath and took off. My goal was to bike to the trailhead for Lang Biang Mountain, 12 km outside of Dalat, and hike up one of its volcanic peaks. It was a sunny day, but not terribly hot because the elevation is around five thousand feet there. But boy, if you're planning to do this ride sometime, I should warn you about the hills. And about eating exhaust. At least it was a paved road. It was really exhilarating coming down the hills, with my big hat brim flopping franatically against my forehead. Got to the trailhead, which was actually an iron gate where you have to pay 10K dong to have the privilage of going up the mountain. Okay, so that's 50 cents. what irked me though was that there's a new road built to the top of the smallest peak, and no official trail for hikers.
So I hiked up 2/3 of the mountain on the shoulder of this road, with "safari"-looking jeeps carrying tourists passing me all along the way. It was actually not that terrible, because of the pine forest. I was in a real forest, not a jungle, a forest! And my feet were crushing pine needles. and I could smell them, and the rich organic debris of the forest floor. Nothing else like it.
The last third of the way up to the peak I chose to go up (not the roaded one - the mountain has five volcanic peaks) was an actual trail deviating from the road, and quite steep in parts. But it's all part of getting up a mountain, so I loved it. Now, I want to tell you that the peak was amazing... but I can't. It was past noon by the time I made it to the very top of this peak, after the biking and hoofing it. There were several fires going in the mountains all around, prescribed, I'm sure, for agriculture. so it was smoky, and visibility was poor, though I could see Dalat 12 km away, and even the road I took to get to the base of the mountain. On the peak itself, there was a large shallow hole, where people tossed their garbage - beer cans, plastic bags, food wrappers, etc. Imagine that. I was glad to be on the top, but after a few minutes of the less than scintillating sights, I was ready to head down to the shade and green.
Although I didn't catch Dalat at the height of its mountain beauty, and got no flavour of its "Swiss Alp"-ness, I am glad I went, because it really is different from the other parts of Vietnam. There's a lot of agriculture here, because of its elevation and cooler climate - flowers, onions, strawberries and mulberries - things that aren't rice, which is what most of Vietnam's agriculture consists of. There are no sprinklers for the crops, so we saw people standing with hoses, hand-watering all their crops! Acres and acres of it. All day.
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