The Road to Nha Trang

     The title of this blog sounds like a life changing non-fiction book.  Well, that is only half right; life changing.  Let me start at the beginning.  When we began planning our trip to Vietnam we planned on going to a small beach town partway up the eastern coast called Nha Trang.  I had found reviews of beaches and this was supposed to be the best.  We booked our hotel rooms and a commuter flight from Ho Chi Minh City to Nha Trang.  After everything was purchased we received an email from Vietnam Airlines saying that actually they did not have a flight for us and we were on a waiting list.  Chinese New Year is one of their busiest times of year and while I was not surprised that this happened I was disappointed that they did not mention any of this on their website.  We considered going somewhere else as staying in Ho Chi Minh was not really an option because nearly all of their businesses would be closing for the celebration.  I looked up other beach destinations and could not find accommodations.  We may have been able to get there easily but we would not have a place to stay when we arrived. I looked at the map, Nha Trang is only about 440 km from Ho Chi Minh City.  That would be the same as driving from Stratton to Denver and back. That didn't seem too far to travel so I began searching for other ways to get to Nha Trang.

By train: you cannot book these tickets on the Internet, you have to hire a travel agent to purchase the tickets for you.  Fine.  We try that...and they were sold out.

By bus: the tickets only cost $25 each and buses leave Ho Chi Minh almost hourly for Nha Trang.  After reading some travel blogs they said that this is an excellent way to travel……. if you want to die.  Hundreds of people die every year riding buses in Vietnam.  Last year a bus driver decided to try and beat an oncoming train, he misjudged it. Everyone died.  Hmmmmm, no thanks.

Renting a car: It is not easy for foreigners to rent cars and if this was an option that we were seriously considering we would have had to start the process much earlier.
Hiring a driver: This was the most expensive option but was safer than a bus and the first travel agent told us that it is a 4 hour drive. The second agent clarified that it would be a 10 hour drive. We found these time discrepancies were quite common in Vietnam.  They're similar to the time discrepancies in Shanghai.  Maybe something will be ready in an hour or maybe in about two days....

     We just wanted to get to the beach so we chose to hire a driver.  Our hotel arranged it for us and it was going to cost us $280.  They were going to pick us up at 4:00 AM because we wanted to spend as much as the day as possible in Nha Trang and we figured we could sleep part of the trip.  On our motorbike tour that day our tour guide said that his buddy would take us for $150.  He was sure that he would be there at 4:00 so we switched plans and hired our tour guide’s buddy to take us instead of the other driver.

4:00 AM:  Matt and I are sitting outside of our hotel all packed and ready for our driver to arrive.

4:10 AM:  The concierge calls the driver to check on when he will arrive and the driver says that he will be there in 15 minutes.

4:40 AM:  Still no driver.  He is now not answering his phone.

4:41 AM: Matt calls our tour guide (Matt’s baby kanagaroo) and asks him if he knows why the driver hasn't arrived.  Saul is very upset and does not know why his friend would do this.

4:41 and 30 seconds: I get sad.

4:42 AM: I decide that we should go to the airport and fly stand by to Nha Trang.

4:45 AM Hotel concierge gets a hold of another driver and they will be at the hotel in 15 minutes.  We will pay this driver $305.  That's more than two Greyhound tickets of comparable distance but much more comfortable.  We were just glad to be leaving.  Finding a driver on New Years Eve was a near miracle. It would be the same as finding someone to leave their family on Christmas Eve to drive strangers for the day and then drive back.

    We began our journey and I went to sleep.  Once in a while he would hit the breaks hard and I would momentarily wake up.  Then the honking began, I could not tell through my earplugs if we were the ones being honked at or doing the honking.  I had no idea what to expect when I sat up and I was shocked.  The cows, the chickens, the sheep, the goats, the buses, the shuttles, the semi-trucks, the motorbikes and the van we were riding in all share the same road.  There was no center-line, or outside line for that matter in parts of the road.  Houses, shacks and shops were only a few yards off of the ‘road.’  I figured out what we were honking at...anything that was in our way, regardless of which side of the road it was on at the time.

       When we would go around a slower vehicle whether it be a motorbike, a bus, a semi, or a man walking his cow we would honk.  It was a sign to both the person we were passing and the person coming straight at us whose lane we were now in, that we were in the area. If the honking did not move the oncoming traffic, a quick flashing of headlights was supposed to produce results.  This logic did not make sense to me because both cars were flashing their lights.  Whose job was it to get out of the way?  I don’t know because at that point my eyes were shut tight.

Just a stretch of the road.

     It was insane. Sometimes there were lines on the road.  Sometimes the road became dirt for a few yards.  It was unpredictable.  At one point our side of the road came to an abrupt stop due to construction.  There were no signs or anything... it was like a cartoon where the road just ends.  We had to drive on the other side of the road for a mile.  Luckily this was one of the small parts of the journey that was on four lane highway.  All but about 5-10 miles were two lane highways. 

    You can sum up their roads like this. There are to vehicle lanes.  The outer edge of each vehicle lane is actually the motorbike lane.  The vehicle lane also doubles as the passing lane for motorbikes.  The oncoming traffic lane is the passing lane for vehicles.  The shoulder of the road on each side is actually a sidewalk, made of dirt, and there will be an occasional motorbike on the sidewalk because he's going against the flow of traffic but doesn't want to cross to the correct side of the road.  Then outside the shoulder we're used to these things called ditches, that's where they put buildings. 

    I posted a mild video of the drive here. 

    Normally on a long road trip I like to read or listen to a podcast.  On this trip my full attention was on the road.  Always wondering when how we'd pass the next bus or whether that cow in the ditch would get spooked an jump into the road.  We saw five or six ambulances on the road during the day. They were probably for motorbikes we were told later, they're not very safe for long travels on the highway the source told us. 

Heading to Grandma's house for the New Year.  Many motorbike drivers wear masks to filter some of the dusty and polluted air they're breathing on the road.

     We stopped twice for bathroom breaks and some Vietnamese coffee and we ended up getting there in just about 7.5 hours.  By 3:00 we were showered, changed and eating on the beach.  More importantly, thanks to hotel concierge by 5pm we'd booked two tickets to fly back to Ho Chi Minh Thursday morning.  The cost for the 50 minute flight for two people... $130 total.  Memories from the "Road to Nha Trang".... priceless.