Nha Trang, Vietnam

Friday, June 27, 2014

Our flight to Nha Trang didn’t leave until 11.45am and so we had a leisurely morning and visit to the gym before talking a taxi to the airport. The flight was delayed 30 minutes but being less than an hour duration we were at the hotel by about 2 pm. There is a relatively new airport now and the drive from the airport to Nha Trang is about 40 min. Lucky for us though as we had a Vietnamese version of Lewis Hamilton driving us.

Much of the 36 km drive into town is along a divide road with immaculate topiary hedging between the lanes and I noticed numerous workers tending to these as we journeyed along. This perfection of presentation is in stark contrast to the local streets of Nha Trang though where there it is not uncommon to see rubbish dumped in large piles along walk ways. The mind boggles as to the thought processes with town planning here.

Our hotel room was on the 25th floor and had views out over the ocean. Mark noticed some workmanship flaws though which were slightly amusing and this becomes more relevant a little later on.

After settling into our hotel room and having some afternoon tea we decided to head out for a walk. We chose the local markets as our destination but this proved to be another disappointment. The large covered space was packed with just more of the same junk we’d seen in HCMC. We left the markets empty handed and headed back to the hotel to get ready for dinner.

Our searching revealed the ‘Sailing Club’ as a suitable dinner destination and so we set off there after some pre-dinner drinks at the hotel. The Sailing Club is located directly on the beach and serves local and international food. Tom chose American, Mark chose Indian and I chose Vietnamese. It was a great night and, given we’re creatures of habit, we plan to return there for dinner tomorrow!