Russia to Ho Chi Minh
“The weather outside is sunny with a temperature of 32°C…”
WTF!! I’m gunna melt in my black trousers and jumper. Not the smartest choice of attire for vietnam but they were essential for surviving russia’s plane transfer…
Straight through security, grab the bag, straight into a guys car with no clue where I’m headed. I just ask for an internet cafe so I can whatsapp Mike. I get the message of where to go before we reach the cafe so the guy wants 900,000 Dong (hehe…snigger) which later I find out was £25, and meant I got completely screwed… ahh well.
First things first, gotta understand the history, and most importantly the recent history of vietnam. We head to the war memorial museum to educate ourselves… not gunna lie, I learnt a lot but some of the exhibits and photos are really grizzly. There was a pickled malformed baby in a jar… moving on then!
Checking into the hostel, we are next off to a recommended motorbike dealer for a pick of his herd. This bike has to last a month and lug my gear and fat ass around. In the end I have a choice of a good looking bike which is really shonky mechanically and a shonky looking bike that is actually in reasonable condition for a £350 motor. As cool as I wanted to, and would have looked on the other bike, I go for the more mechanically sound option – the engineer wins. I end up with an ugly but reasonable WIN 100.
Jumping on my new Win we head back to the Hostel. Its an amazingly skinny and tall building with an open air bar on the roof – good call. This is where we spend the night eating drinking and trying to convince Mike to go on a pub crawl with us. It looks like so much fun, the bar staff are getting everyone to do free shots and limbo under a bar! I want to go but at this point I’m running on empty having been awake for about 20 hours. There will be pleanty time to party, time to call it a night