OMG! We survived but barely! That BS I said last post about maybe the train would be luxury and air conditioned was just that....total BS....or I guess the nice way to say it would be to say that was my Pollyanna perspective in high gear. LOL
We did have a great surprise while waiting for the train in Danang though! My friend from Kelowna was here in Danang for work (he works in International Education) and so he came to the train station to have a little visit while we waited for our train to arrive. It was soooo good to see Gordon and I think fun for him too as he’s been on the road for two weeks now and having a conversation with someone from home is nice when you’re solo and away so much.
As is often the case, the area around the train station was anything but grand. A little seedy might be a better description. But....when that is all there is and it is time for dinner....you just gotta do it. Lucky for us, there was a little noodle place across the street where we were able to grab a bite and have a chair to sit on while we waited for our train. The man who owns this restaurant must be a little affluent as he has several birds hanging in the place. He was telling us that some of them are humming birds and that he has to feed them unpasteurized honey that costs him $10 US/month as he has 4 of those birds. Yes, he must be a little wealthy if he can feed hummingbirds! He was a nice guy too though and let us stay there in the restaurant right until our train came. It gave us a spot to play cards and to have a visit with Gordon when he arrived.
We’d been hopeful that the train might be a little better than the one in SaPa as here we are in the more populated part of the county but no way! In fact, this train was worse! How can I say it was worse? Well, where the train to SaPa had a very tight fit into the toilet...this train only had a squat toilet! OMG! It was horrible! This truly is the stuff nightmares are made of! And to quote my friend Gail, it totally explains why so many people seem to be constantly “horking”. She figures it is because they are trying to get the stench out of their throats!!!!! Seriously, it was bad people.....you’d have to see it to believe it bad!!! And we were on there for 11 hours. Lynda and Darlene have bladders of steel but Gail and I had to suffer many a trip to the loo! As well, I ended up not being able to sleep at all so I actually took it on myself to clean the toilets several times during the night. Whenever I had to go again I would go with enough time to be able to clean the place before I used it. No....I didn’t have a toilet brush and Ajax but I did have a sprayer filled with water on the wall and so I’d just hose down that room from about half way up the walls and keep flushing and flushing until I could sort of breath again. Then when I was finished I’d just walk up and down the aisle outside the sleeping rooms until all the smelly water (I won’t say what it smelled like) was off the bottom of my flip flops. Usually I like a little more room in the bathroom but was glad these horrid little spots were tiny and didn’t take too long to hose down! I can promise you that I will never go on another one but if I did and for those of you who’d like to experience it first hand....I strongly recommend bringing a spray bottle of disinfectant with you! The other thing that must be mentioned here is that when the train attendant came round with clean sheets and pillow cases for us (we got them only because we asked) he told us that no....there are no clean blankets.....you just use the one that the people before you used. Aggggghhhhhhh! Gail was in the bathroom (probably puking) when the pillow cases were dropped off for us and Darlene just said (as she was changing her own pillowcase)...”quick Lorrie...change Gail’s before she gets back or we’ll never be able to keep her on the train!” I simply put her clean pillow case over the dirty one as I didn’t want to see that which had nearly left Darlene blind! The pillows are soooo disgusting....we’re pretty sure they are as old as the train!
The 11 hour train journey took us through some beautiful countryside (most of it was in the dark but there was plenty to see too as it’s fully daylight by 6 a.m.). One sad thing though was that fairly early on in the trip our train hit something. I’m pretty sure it was a cow or buffalo on the tracks but have no way of knowing for sure what it was. I just know that trains hit them often and we sure hit something! Everyone else in my cabin was sound asleep so they didn’t have to feel it but I was shocked to discover how much the train would be impacted by hitting something. The blow reverberated through the whole train and then the conductor slammed on the brakes so hard that I can’t believe we stayed on the tracks and that no one fell out of bed! Yes, it was a long ride but in hindsight I have to admit that it is those hardships of travel that make for the best stories after the fact.
Our driver was there to meet us in Nahtrang and he was so sweet. He could see that we were exhausted from our 11 hour journey so he stopped at a coffee place for us to get a nice cold coffee. Then he took us to a street vendor who was selling sandwiches so we all had some food in our bellies for the next leg of the journey.
The drive would take us to DaLat, high in the mountains, about 4-5 hours away. Our vehicle was a 14 passenger van and so we had three full seats to be able to spread out on. It gave all of us a chance to snooze for at least part of the journey. Once we got into the switchbacks though it was pretty hard to snooze and not fall of the seat!
At one point, as we were above the clouds and fully into fog, I said to our driver....”please look for somewhere to stop that there is a toilet”. I figured for sure there would be some kind of a restaurant or something along the road but no...the best he could find was someone’s house and they said I could pee behind one of their outbuildings. OMG! Darlene and Gail decided to join me and you’ll never believe the adventure we had. As we rounded the corner of that outbuilding we came across the woman’s husband in a small enclosure below us....he was in there with a bunch of chickens. I guess it was chicken killing day and he was doing the deed. Yes folks, there we were...peeing behind some Vietnamese person’s outbuilding looking down on a chicken killing event. Damn we have some great adventures! LOL!
We finally arrived in DaLat and checked into our hotel, the Tulip 1. It is a nice hotel but....you’ll never guess.....there is no elevator and all four of us have to do stairs to get to our rooms. Gail and Darlene have just one story to climb down to but Lynda and I have to go down 2 floors. On the upside...DaLat is supposed to have really great street food so I guess this means we’ll get to have extra. :-)
Beds here are huge and super comfy and the room is soooo quiet and cool. No air conditioning needed as we are up in the mountains. On the downside, Gail saw a mosquito so she’s slathering on the deet. But on the upside....there is a bakery right across the street and they have some really yummy stuff!!!!! :-)
It will be an early night tonight! Till next time,
Darlorlyngai
No comments:
Post a Comment