Empress Hotel Dalat

... so rife at home. Understatement to say it's just so wrong.

A great day, and a great place. Lovely friendly people and a beautiful part of Vietnam.

Oh, that title..I was catching my breath on the hillside and looked up ahead...I saw a brown furry head, and I was just about to leap off the path in anticipation of horns and a growl, thinking for some obscure reason it was a wild boar, when Ro pointed out it was a horse...doh!

... short hop by plane from Saigon, literally no sooner had we gone up than we began the descent and the scenery was beautiful, so much greenery and contrast, it looked like a patchwork quilt. Then about half an hour on the transfer bus (a few hairy bends!) and I was in central Dalat - the helpful bus conductor pointed down a street, and just said, "walk 1KM"....clearly he was unaware of my impressive talent for mishap so ...

Alright there folks, Hope your all well. We are fan-dabby-dosy and in a place called Hoi An at the minute. The easyriders trip was unreal. Definately the pick of the trip so far. We got to see so much stuff that we didnt know was included on the trip so it was far better than we expected. Firstly our two guides, Tom and An(Jerry!), were sound as an old irish pound and an absolute wealth of knowledge. The scenery was some of the best I've ever seen and the people were ...

... jolted from side to side and accompanied by a sudden burst of the sound of metal rubbing metal that not even my ipod can drown out. Tom, Nick and I were the striving members of our clan, the rest of the group having taken off in different directions at different times. After breakfast at our hotel with the boys, I headed back to bed, not feeling well from the journey. That afternoon, Tom, Nick and I explored the area surrounding our hotel, coming to the conclusion (as we had ...

... the Malcolm in the Middle episode where the family gets stuck in traffic for hours. Anyway, after sitting on the side of the road for about an hour, we began to see some movement - Yay! But not for long, about 20 meters up the road, we stuck again for about another 30 minutes. Boo :-(

Luckily (?) the bus had a TV, and we were treated to the ...

... the Crazy House is unfinished as well, as Dalat locals did not take well to the innovative design. What is complete, is a multi-storied building, very organic in nature, with wavy walls, clever peep holes, hidden caves and bridges intersecting each other. Each room of the hotel has a different theme with tacky, sometimes scary animals looming above the beds - an eagle, wings spread, a tiger baring it's teeth, and a kangaroo with glowing red ...

... backpacker.... And in Saigon it's noticeably more touristy than anywhere I've been in Asia so far.... as well as Japanese, Koreans etc... I'm also travelling at the time of year when Vietnamese take their holidays which doesn't help!

That night we kind of took over the locals bar where they sell the cheapest beer in town! Me and my roomie Kim, Laos buddy Malia, Matt (who I'd met in Laos too) and his travel buddies, and Cardiff Ali and her travel buddies ...

... great to be get of the town and up into the hills, which were stunning.

The first stop was without a doubt the most kitsch temple I've ever seen, pretty normal from outside...



...but inside it was definitely unique; the altar area had the ...

... back row was that it was elevated, so the headlights of approaching cars shone directly into your face, but we just put on the eyemasks and tried to forget about it...

After what seemed like about 4 days we stopped at a road (it definitely wasn't a 'motorway') shack (it definitely wasn't a 'service station') for some **** (it definitely wasn't 'food') and very bizarely bumped into the 2 Dutch guys who were on ...