Up in the Mounatins in Dalat

at the top of the cable cars
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Up early and flew up to the mountains, felt bad flying as it only took 40mins to fly there, but if i had gone by bus it would have taken 9 hours, along mountain roads, and there no way near the best drivers! So got there at 8am already to make the most of it. I went over the weekend and we also had 2 public holidays for the liberation day on 30th April, and labour day on 1st May. So made the most of the four days.

It was beautiful from the moment we landed, surround by mountains and green. It was great to breath fresh air too, and the temp was so much cooler about 10c cooler than Ho chi Minh city and a brezze too, AHhhh!! We had a beautiful drive up into the mountains into Dalat city. The hotel owner was fanastic she was so kind like a mum, she checked that i was wearing my suncream and i had the flu (i know again) and she was checking that i was feeling ok all the time, and she made us a big full breakfast in the moring to fill us up for the day ahead.

working the fields
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We met up with 2 easy riders, these guys have a degree in tourism and have learnt english too. They live in the area so know all the place to see. They take you off the normal tourist route to see the real life dalat.

on 28th i went to the Minh Nguyet Cu Sy Lam Pagoda, a pogoda bulit on a mountain over a lake, it was beautifull and completly relaxing an peacefull, the views were amazing. i had to take the cable cars up there though , i have discoverd i really have a foriber of them, they were so high and the wind was going and i was on it for ages as it ran between to mountains.  It began to rain early afternoon, and was cold too when it rained, first time i have felt cold, i had to put on a jumper!!!! The lake looked a lot like a scotish loch! i went around the lake as i wanted to ride an elephant, but when i got there i decided not too as the elephant was it's self and was chained up too, it looked so sad, so i just could do it, i fed it sugar cane instead. It was beautifull animal but so sad to see it unhappy. I sat in a straw hut as the rainpoured down was beautiful. had dinner in a local resturant, where the food was all over the floor, not very clean at all. chatted with local guys about football, ahhh the unviersal language! sean making me watch match of the day has come in useful!! lol lol !!

the lake at pogdoa
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29th i went all though the mountains and down the other side, was stuning, looked at lot like england though in th elake district. Stopped off at a vegtable fields, there all  round and the have them all the way down the mountain, in stages. they grow coffee, they do well if the grow coffee they have the most money! the also grow strawberries which the french introduce, they export to holland, any dutch comapnies have helped them to develop there strawberry growing. the grow vegtables fro vietnam and asia, they also grow flowers too. I went an saw a silk worm factory. it was very intresting to see how they get silk. the cocoons put into boiling water to soften them as they are so hard and then the they then thread them onto machines which unravel the cocoon, and wind up the silk thread, and the silk worms dies, they gather them up, as they eat them. the silk is amazingly strong.

the elephant
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Went to see a waterfall called elephant falls, no health and safety here we climbed down all these rocks to half way down the fall, and then went into a cave at the bottomthe spray was amazing it knocked you back i got soaked too. then we climbed down more to the bottom and sat on rocks, was loverly.

30th - liberation day, when the south liberation amry stormed the place in 1975, the fall of the VC in vietnam. The whole world an his wife were out in Dalat, as the veitnamese normal work 6 days a week so public holidays are a blessing here and they dont waste them. most people in the city have family over the country so about 7 million of the 9 million residents in ho chi minh went travelling. ( well it felt like that) !! i went for a treck up the biggest mounatin in Dalat called Lambien. It was real quite steep, took about 2 hours but was amazing at the top could see for miles and miles an miles. all the vietnames were there with their families enjoying themselves, there no different from us on what we do real on bank holidays!! eating ice-cream, riding pony's, camping!

the mountain fields
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went to a local lat hill tribe village. the leader spoke to me about the people, how they must to eat monkey's brains while they were a live- loverly. there are about 3,000 people in about 4 villages they live off teh land, the ones who grow coffee have the concerte houses, the rest have long houses the traditional wooden houses.

Saw the summer place, we had to wear these big sock shoes over our own, as we walked aorund. was funny it was a very 1930's building.

my easy rider guy was so funny he had just had a baby girl 20 days earlier. he would say "oh my buddha" and "maybe yes or maybe no" and " same, same, but different" or "same, same, but similar"!!!!