April 20. Da Lat to Nha Trang. 136km.
As you can see from the above route diagram, the roads out of Dalat were rather twisty, which was both great fun and scary as hell at the same time. Mainly scary once it started pouring with rain...
By this stage, Xavi had decided to continue on ahead, alone, as his money was running out and he was looking for work further up north. Aaron had two friends from back home meet us in Dalat, starting off later than us, who joined the crew. Down one, up two bought the group to five.
I managed to leave my glasses behind at the hotel in Mui Ne - luckily Aaron's mate, Sonny, picked them up for me as he came to catch us!
By this stage, Xavi had decided to continue on ahead, alone, as his money was running out and he was looking for work further up north. Aaron had two friends from back home meet us in Dalat, starting off later than us, who joined the crew. Down one, up two bought the group to five.
I managed to leave my glasses behind at the hotel in Mui Ne - luckily Aaron's mate, Sonny, picked them up for me as he came to catch us!
One of the more notable things that happened was Aaron snapping his throttle cable while ascending one of the hills. He managed to undo the grip and jerry-rig a steel cable onto the grip - a good effort to get to the nearest mechanic! His rear brake pedal also lost all feeling due to an over-worn return spring, more bush mechanic work to fix that too.
The potholes we had to dodge...
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Not a whole lot happened in the town of Nha Trang. Nha Trang is a very touristy area with a tonne of Russian tourists, so much so to the extent that a lot of the signage is actually in Russian - more than English!
We met up with one more of Aaron's mates, Charlie, here before continuing on to our next stop together, the group growing to six!
Most nights were spent having a few beers at a bar down the street because they had a free pool table and cheap drinks - just under $1aud for a beer and a rum and coke together.
The six riders plus Rosie, whom I met in Battambang, Cambodia a month or so earlier and a couple of her new travel friends joined us for a ride north to try to find a nice swimming beach. We came back empty handed but the views along the way were rather incredible.
Nha Trang is notorious for theft and scams - two girls from my hostel both had their bags stolen while I was there - and those are just the ones I know about! This plus the fact that the place is just swarmed with tourists meant that I wasnt sad to leave...
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