Richard here: This day turned out to start very early. At 12:00 AM a bombardment started outside our hotel room. It seems we were destined to have front row seat at the fireworks celebrating the start of Vietnamese New Year, the year of the Tiger. For 20 solid minutes we watched the most fireworks per minute I have ever seen. It was like the 10 second finale we get with American fireworks shows only never stopping.

This night was also a restless one for me. I have been able to ride on and off with a separated shoulder and very sore upper chest. It has been riding on stamina and a high threshold of pain. I rode the day leaving Cambodia because I wouldn’t have missed it for anything. This was the craziest, worst, fun road I have ever ridden on. It was much more like technical single track than a road. The road did take a toll on me and finally the wise part of my psyche has prevailed. I am hanging up riding for the rest of the trip and will struggle mentally finishing in the van for our last two days. Hopefully rehab will be quick when I get home.

Once again today’s ride is nothing what our itinerary says. Our plan was to pedal from Cao Lanh to My Tho on a mix of country trails and paths and some minor tarmac through little villages. Quintessential Viet Nam. I think I am through with quintessential everything. At first I thought that Viet Nam was much, much better off than Cambodia but even seeing the river people and the way they lived, not much difference with their Cambodian neighbors; maybe just a wee bit less poverty. We boarded the bus for what was intended to be an hour’s ride and then get on our bikes. Instead it was a two hour ride before we stopped to unload the van. When we got out, the van with our bikes was nowhere in sight and lost! Now it was 10:30 a.m. and we were suppose to ride 60K yet today and we hadn’t even set pedal to the pavement yet!

45 minutes later, the van pulls up and we are told the regular support van will not be able to follow us on the little roads so we will have to carry enough water for 2 hours of riding. Thanks, but I only have one small water bottle and not way to carry water except in my jersey pockets. Rich loads me up, Janie fills her handle bar bag and Jim loads his jersey. I cross my fingers that we do not run out of water and we are off and pedaling towards quintessential Viet Nam.

Actually, once e got on the paths it was really nice. I started to think about the film “Apocalypse Now” as we followed this sidewalk path that served as a road through these small water front villages. Most of the crops were rice but also some fruit and even several Bonsai tree farms. It takes many years to harvest Bonsai trees and Inh says they are very profitable; especially the bigger trees. The path is shared by motorbikes as well as pedestrian and bicycle traffic. I had to really keep my balance when a motorbike wanted to pass. We crossed so many little bridges that looked like they would collapse with our weight!

We rode for about 25K and guess what? We loaded into the van once again. This was not looking good. We drove at least two hours to a lunch area and Inh was once again amazed at how little we were eating. Hell, we hadn’t even ridden far enough to warrant being hungry. And he was leading the pack so we couldn’t go running off without him again! It was beginning to get on our nerves.

Once again we had to take water with us since the support van would not be following us. We travelled on a dirt road that made the Cambodian border ride look easy. This one was no more than a foot path that followed a canal and past people’s homes. Luckily there were no motorbikes. Hell, there shouldn’t have even been us! At one point I almost hit a tree because my front wheel got stuck in a rut and I almost couldn’t clip out in time! Was there a point to this riding? Were we headed in the direction of our next hotel or were we just running in circles?

Inh explained to us finally that he just has these routes and he likes to give people tastes of different areas and different road conditions. This was not us. We are point A to point B riders. We love going through villages, meeting people and taking pictures but not getting in and out of a van to ride 20K here and 25K there. Yep, you guessed it, we were getting back in the van after another 30K to go to the hotel. We started asking some questions and found that we could probably do another 15K on these sidewalk roads, so we saddled up and rode some more. We were not happy. Because the pace was so slow, it was 5:30 by the time we got off our bikes and my butt was sore.

Tonight’s hotel was called the Chuong Duong Hotel and it was just a bit better than the last hotel. I still would love to have a hot shower; maybe when I get home?! I am running low on all my toiletries and I think for the first time I have packed rather well. I am leaving clothes behind as I usually do and that leaves me more room to bring home momentos of our trip; like the stories and pictures aren’t enough!

Hoping for a better ride tomorrow as we head towards Saigon. It has been a pretty stressful time here in Viet Nam so far. I am not sure we have bonded with Inh and we definitely don’t like his riding agenda. Maybe less van riding tomorrow? Anyway, hoping for internet access in Saigon!

Ride on......

Link to today’s photos

Click on comments to post one