Adventures of Taffy & Ray

More than a month into our trip, we have just started to scratch the surface of Vietnamese culture.  We stayed on Con Dao Island for nearly a month…which was the perfect amount.  We were able to meet many locals, born and raised on the Island, as well as some foreigner transplants.  We also learned a few good lessons on Con Dao:

1- DO NOT, under any circumstance, drink rice wine after drinking any kind of carbonated drink.  Really.

2- DO NOT approach the dogs…Con Dao has no dog food and these poor animals are very hungry (and also do not like western women).

3- Vietnam is an extremely patriarchal society–especially on the Island.  It was very rare to see a man and woman together, however,

4- It is common for men to hold hands and be very affectionte towards each other (reminds me of southern men and also SF men).

Since the last blog post, we’ve been “camping” with Con Dao locals.  “Camping” on Con Dao doesn’t mean pitching a tent and sleeping outside, to them it means picking a secluded place to hang out, drink beer, make a fire and cook whole fish, and talk (or at least, try to talk).  We enjoyed the fish, but the folks we were with preferred canned meat!  We also spent a lot of time in the water snorkling.  Although we really wanted to get Scuba certified, in the end we decided it was too much money…boo hoo.

But the snorkling wasn’t bad.  In fact, we were able to see many different types of coral, fish, eels, lobster.  We finally figured out the best time to fish was at sunset, when the fish are practically jumping in your hand.  Rob caught a fish and we took it to a restaurant and asked them to cook it for us.  They did and it tasted great.

Most of the time was spent on the moto-bike, which was our day time air-conditioning.  We took the bike everywhere, including to the top of Thanh Gia mountain, which at 577 meters is the highest mountain on the Island.  It was so steep that at times, Heather had to get off the bike and walk so Rob could keep going up.  It took about an hour to get all the way to the top.  (We almost walked, but after conquering the mountain on motobike we realized we would have never made it up on foot).  The top of the mountain was a military base and they promptly told us to leave, so we don’t have any fascinating photos of the Island from the top, but we did find some trails through the jungle.  One of the trails led to some sort of boobie-trap…that’s when Heather demanded we turn around  and Rob reluctantly agreed.

One of the last nights there, we saw a motobike crash.  We were the first on the scene - one guy was lying on the ground unconcious.  Rob checked his pulse and said he reeked of alcohol.  Apparently, drinking is the island past time.  Even the police and military get really drunk and scoot around town…we decided to nix the motobike riding after that!

We broke down and visited the prisons with an english speaking guide.  It is difficult to even express the horror of what the prisoners had to endure.  In the 1800’s the French built multiple large prisons.  Some rooms held up to 200 men and they kept them all shackled.  Other rooms were made for torture.  The guide explained that many prisoners were hard laborers and worked day in and day out in the extreme heat.  Occasionally, prisoners would escape while working, but very few succeeded.  In the 1970’s, the American’s were forced to demolish the french tiger cages because of international pressure, however they secretly built even more brutal prisons on the outskirts of town, where the journalists couldn’t find them.  On May 1st, 1975 the prisoners were released, and this day remains a Vietnamese holiday.

In honor of all the prisoners who died while in detention, a giant cemetary was built.  We spent an evening walking through (without a guide) and Heather heard some strange noises.  Later, when we were with the guide, he told us stories of ghosts that haunt the cemetary….. oooohhhh scarrryy.

The flight from Con Dao to HCMC left very early - we had to get up at 5:00am, but the upside is that we were able to see the sun rise…astonishing (see photos above).  We stayed in HCMC for a couple of days and met a Vietnamese english teacher, Mr. Hai.  We spent an evening with Mr. Hai, who took us to his favorite massage spa…oh la la.  Then we went to dinner at his favorite place and had steamed fish, wrapped in rice paper with lettuce, pinapple, and star fruit.  We had an opportunity to speak with him about many political issues and learned that his father worked for the Americans during the war. 

During an afternoon sitting in the park, we were approached by two Vietnamese girls who wanted to practice their english.  They had many questions for us like, “If you had as much money as Bill Gates, what would you spend it on”?  Bill Gates had recently visited HCMC and folks are anxious to speak about him.  We spoke with the girls for a couple of hours.  Later that day, we met an independant travel guide, Mr. Tung.  He said he could take us to Monkey Island for $20..but being tourists on a very limited budget we said no.  He finally agreed to take us for $10…how could we refuse.

We met Mr. Tung at 8:30am and hopped a bus to the ferry then to another bus.  This bus took us down a very bumpy road, about 45 minutes, but we were able to see the outskirts of HCMC which were miles and miles of mangrove jungles and swamps mixed with the occasional newly built elaborate houses (we later learned that Vietnam is just now allowing citizens to purchase land so many orante houses are being built wherever land is abundant).  The folks making the bigs bucks in the outskirts of town are farming lobster, prawn, etc.

Monkey Island was defintely worth the $10 trip.  Not knowing what to expect we were pleasantly surprised to see that none of the monkey’s were caged, they simply live in a natural setting, allowed to roam whever they please. 

The park rangers give visitors three small bags of popcorn to feed the little rascals.  The monkeys know the bags of popcorn really well…we call them the invasion of the popcorn snatchers.  Heather had a bag in her hand, about to open it to share with all the little babies, and while she was looking one way, an enterprising monkey came up behind her, jumped on her arm and snatched the bag!  Later, while relaxing on a bench with a little monkey - nice photo op - the rascal snatched Heather’s hat and took off!  Gunny ran after the theif…apparently the monkey only wanted the plastic flower off the hat and dropped the hat in the chase.

Crocodiles were also living on the island, but they were sleeping during our visit.  So not too much to report there.  The ride back landed us on the very back of the bus and every time we hit a bump, we would hit the ceiling of the bus.  Rob has a nice shiner as a reminder of the tour.  We also learned that Mr. Tung served in the South Vietnam “Marine Corps” and fought alongside Americans during the war.  He told us many detailed stories of the missions he went on and showed us his many battle injuries.

The next day we left for an 8 hour bus ride to Dalat.  Our bus ticket is an open bus ticket, which means we travel from HCMC to Hanoi, stopping in Dalat, Nha Trang, Hue, Hoi An and then Hanoi.  We can stay in each town as long as we want (both tickets cost $34…yes).  

The bus itself was deluxe..air conditioned, few passengers, but the ride was unlike anything either of us has ever experienced.  In Vietnam, the roads are small and motobikes are everywhere, but the mantra seems to be, the bigger the vehicle the more right of way you have.  Honking the horn every 2 seconds (to alert the motobikes a big bus is coming) and slamming on the breaks (to avoid hitting the motobikes that do not heed the bus) is the way we drove the entire 8 hours.  Again, the IPOD saves the day and drowns out the annoying horn.

Dalat is in the mountains and has a very nice temperture - mostly in the 70’s.  We visited one waterfall (Dalat has about 4 waterfalls nearby), found the cemetery and went trailblazing through the forest up to the top of the mountain.  We we arrived at the top (probably 2 miles straight up a paved road) we were informed that we had to go back down the same way…the map indicated otherwise, but the park ranger wouldn’t budge.  After he drove away, Gunny found a “trail” which we decided would be an interesting shortcut.  Well, short cut it was.  The first mile was through the forest, and incredibly beautiful, but when we popped out of the forest we were on private ferraced farm lands.  We had to meander through about 10 different farms, avoid dogs and land owners to get back to the park headquarters!

Our favorite aspect about Dalat (and Vietnam in general) is the market.  Fresh vegetables and fruits are abundant, and by shopping around, we can get enough food to make a delux sandwish for $1! Dalat is also known for local specialties - candied strawberries, mulberries and local wine.  The wine is pretty good at $2 a bottle and is the only place they make wine in Vietnam.  Artichokes and Avocados are abundant, but the vietnamese use them differently.  Artichokes are made into tea, very tasty and good for the complexion - they say.  Avacados are used for smoothies and ice cream — as a sweet treat!Speaking of sweet treats, we walked past a street vendor selling fried bread with flattened banana in the middle…tasty delicious goodness…and at 12 cents a pop this is surely to become one of our favorite treats.

We plan on spending at least 10 days here (mostly because of the cool weather) to see more waterfalls, pagodas, hiking trails and anything we can do independantly.  The “Easy Riders” (a group of independant motobike tour guides) are eager for our business, but we’ve managed to keep them a bay for the time being.

We are slowly learning the language and can now ask how much something is in Vietnamese and understand the response! We get much more respect by butchering their language than asking in english.

Hope you’ve enjoyed our stories….send us an email as we love to hear from friends and family!

We had a nice, air conditioned ride in a car to the hydrofoil port.  The nice lady who did not reserve a ticket for us on the slow boat, did in fact contact the hydrofoil office and reserve us 2 tickets.  Once we had the tickets in hand, we had to figure out which boat actually went to Con Dao, and everyone we asked kept pointing out to the ocean.  Oh no, we both thought.  Here we have our tickets, but we have no idea which boat to board. 

A nice fellow pointed us in the right direction, and soon we were on a boat we felt confident was correct.  This boat was small and the windows were fogged up, so we couldn’t see out the windows.  Heather started to get sea sick and wondered if she could make it the 3 hours without yaking.  Rob took it in stride and tried to make Heather as comfortable as possible.

About 10 minutes into the ride, everyone on the boat got up from their seats and went to outside.  We couldn’t figure out what the heck was going on.  People were exiting the boat!!  The nice man who directed on the port also informed us that we need to board another ship.  To this day we have no idea what the heck happened…whether the boat we orginally boarded was not working properly or what, but the boat we boarded next was very nice and Heather could see out the windows so everything was okay.

Hydrofoil sidenote:  Since our arrival to Con Dao, the hydrofoil has been stopped from running to Vung Tao and back.  Apparently, the company running the business did not have radios on the boat and the captain did not have his own license…he was using his friends boat license.  Furthermore, they had a boat that almost sunk on rough seas.  We will be flying back to the mainland!

After two hours of motoring along, we began to see the Islands, collectively known as Con Dao.  The water was turquoise and we could see right to the bottom. From the boat, the mountains of Con Son Island looked lush and inviting.  We docked at Ben Dam port expecting to have taxis offer rides, but to our surprise no taxis awaited us.  Instead, the nice man who had been steering us along offered us a ride on his bus, the Con Dao resort bus.  He wanted us to stay at his resort all along.  Rob, being the great hotel finder, accepted the bus ride but made it clear that we wouldn’t necessarily stay at their resort.  The bus ride from the port to the main city was unbelievable.  Palm trees, mango trees, mountains and an ocean view was all around us.

The resort ended up being too expensive ($25) so we proceeded on foot to the city area.  It was hot…our back packs were very heavy and we made a pact then and there to thin out the packs!  Rob negotiated a hotel for $20 at Siagon Resort, with the same person (Vinh) who rented him his hotel room a year ago on Con Dao Island.  Vinh remembered Rob and offered us a very nice, large room for cheaper than anything listed on their rate list.

After checking into the hotel, we quickly rented a motobike.  Con Dao doesn’t have the congested traffic of HCMC and Rob is a great motobike driver so we set off for the airport beach.  Much of the island has been developed since Rob’s visit here in 2004, so our first mission was to scale the wall that had been built to block the airport beach.  It wasn’t extremely high, but it was extremely long - blocking us from the beautiful beach.  Of course, we conquered the wall and witnessed our first of many sunsets.  It was righteous!  Not a footstep on the beach other than ours and we enjoyed it until we could no longer see the ocean.

The next day we went hiking to Ong Dong beach.  This hike takes us through the forest and we were lucky enough to see a grey haired monkey as soon as we got there.  Rob was able to take a picture, but its hard to see the little guy.  See if you can find him in the photos above.

The trail led to beach that wanted to charge us about $5 to snorkle, so naturally we set off in search of a place to play free of charge.  Rob has an uncanny ability to find perfect spots for relaxing and snorkling and we ended up in a little cove on a coral beach.  We tried to snorkle, but the wind was blowing too hard and we couldn’t see much.  On the way back, Rob got a small case of heat exhaustion…he sweats so much that its hard for him to retain water!

We soon found out that the Sea Festival was extended to Con Dao as well as Vung Tao, so the main street was lined with booths of local vendors selling their specialty meals.  We tried new foods, like Banh Xeo (kinda like pancakes, but not sweet) Bun thit nu’ong (pork skewers) and ba ba ba Bia (333 beer).  By the way the main street overlooks the ocean, so as soon as the sun goes down, the moon comes up and makes for a very nice evening stroll.

Rob wanted to try night snorkling, so he put on his head lamp and hit the water.  He was so stoked to see all the fish and sea critters at night!  On our back to our hotel, we found Rainbow Dive Shop.  This is the one and only dive outfit on the island, and it is run by Bin - a vietnamese man who has lived in Norway for the last 20 years and speaks great english!  He helped us secure a hotel where his shop is located for about $14 dollars.  We also met Magnus, who had just arrived from Sweden and will be working for Bin for the next 6 monts.  Magnus is what we like to call a gentle giant!  We had some drinks with our new found friends and called it a night.

The next day we decided to live large, rent a scooter and try out the fancy restaurant at Con Dao Resort.  The food was very expensive and very disgusting.  Rob ordered chicken with lemongrass, but what he got was anybody’s guess.  He couldn’t eat it, which for anybody who knows Gunny knows he’ll eat just about anything.  So needless to say, we won’t go back to the fancy pants place anymore!

We motored around the island, searching for roads off the beaten path and scouted places for hiking and snorkling.  It was getting late and we found a road that looked promising for a good sunset view.  The road was VERY steep and Rob downshifted from second to first and reved the gas too much and we did a wheelie!  Heather slipped right off the back and landed on her feet unharmed, but poor Rob had to hang on to the bike.  He wrestled to get control, but the scooter kick his ass!  After making sure Rob was alright, we both laughed and laughed.  Rob had perform cosmetic surgery on the bike before we returned it!  [Coinsidentally, that same morning Rob broke a foot pedal off another motobike trying to kick start the bike]

After our motobike spill we decided to take it easy and explore the “city”.  Heather got a mani/pedi for 75 cents and we found the market.  We made friends with the pinapple vendor and we still see her almost everyday.  For 35 cents, she’ll cut up a whole pinapple for us…they are so sweet and juicy!  We also found the internet cafe (yes, there is one here on the island) and went fishing in the afternoon.  Rob didn’t catch anything and the local fisherman lauged at his pole…making sure to show us their fish caught with bamboo poles!

Staying with the melow theme, we walked down a beach to find a quiet spot for reading.  Oh the trash!  Plastic everywhere.  We think the ships that dot the ocean just heave their trash into the sea, as if it is a giant dump!  Well, we did find a refuge away from the garbage and we spent a lovely afternoon under that giant wispy trees.  We were also introduced to a little thing called the “sand fly”.  At first, the bite starts out as a small red dot.  You think its some kind of rash, but then they start to swell and itch like a million mosquitos.  Rob counted all the bites on Heather and it came to a total of 86 bites!  She looks as if she has chicken pox!  Bin taught us how to make pure coconut oil, which repels those nasty sand flies!

After the shock of the wheelie subsided, we rented another motobike to go back to the airport beach.  As soon as we arrive to the path, the bike dies.  Instead of foregoing our daily snorkle and beach trek, we push the bike down the path (about 1 mile) thinking that it will start in a couple of hours.  Well, we were wrong.  It didn’t start, and a local that was there dropping off some fisherman couldn’t start it either.  So we had to push it back to the street and over to the airport (2 miles in all).  Rob tried to jumpstart it multiple times, and that was a very funny sight!  Imagine him running with the bike, then jumping on and trying to start it that way.  Heather was very amused!  A very nice gentleman was working the airport gate and he proceed to help us with the bike.  His name was Goong…which is one of the many names of Rob also!  Goong spoke very good english and let us know the problem was electrical.  He called our hotel for us and they came to get us, but not with a car mind you.  They brought two other bikes….one for us to ride and another to pull the broken down bike.  They used an electrical cord to tow the bike, and the other bike had a baby and two grown men.  Yes, things are done a bit differently in Vietnam!

The next day brought one of the best sights yet!  As we set out on our daily adventure, we wound up at the “end of the road”.  Bin had told us the snorkling was good and showed us exactly where we needed to swim to see the good reefs.  The reefs were beautiful - purple, red, white, brain-looking, tree looking- the fish were neon colors and the water was so clear we could see for at least 40 feet down.  We swam over to a close island and were amazed at how we came to be here.  Chickens lived on that island and they were cock-a-doodle doodling, which made us laugh.  We decided it was time to go swim back to the main island, and just before we took off, Rob saw splashing in the water and exclaimed “what is that”?  Of course, this exclamation scared Heather to death, but then we could see that it was two giant green sea turtles, copulating!  We couldn’t resist seeing them up close and swam over to the mating turtles.  However, at first glance of us the male turtle dismounted the female and charged us!  We thought he was going to chomp us, but all he did was swoop by us a couple of times, as if to say “get the hell out of here!”.  It was amazing!  They were probably 3 feet long and about 100 pounds each.

Over the next few days we did some drinking, snorkling and more drinking. Rob made some new fisherman friends at breakfast, who offered him shot after shot of snake alcohol!  After drinking almost 2 bottles of the snake juice a fight broke out between the fishermen and we had to abandon ship!  We found the most amazing reef (after a gnarly hike down the side of a mountain) which was host to a blue and yellow eel, lobsters, small tuna, needle fish (see the photo of rob catching a needle fish), squid, multiple coral reefs, a red star fish and much much more. 

We finally made it to the top of wheelie road just to be turned away by the military.  Sidenote:  50% of the people on the island are military.  Every morning and night, communist propaganda is broadcast over the loud speakers that are strung up to every other light post.

Then we met Joop and Jordan who own a pearl farm here on Con Dao.  Jordan is Aussie and Joop is vietnamese and they own a bar named Viddao (which is also their son’s name).  The night we were visiting the bar  they were closed for Jordan’s birthday, but they invited us to stay for dinner and drinks.  We had a fish soup that was scrumptous and fresh sashimi with wasabi leaves.  It was fantastic.  Joop served up whiskey and cokes all evening, which lasted until about 3:00 in the morning!  Yesterday was spent sleeping off the worst hangover Rob and Heather has ever had and today we went to the museum to learn about the history of Con Dao.

Con Dao has a very unsettling history beginning in the early 1500’s.  The french claimed Con Dao its own, and subsequently occupied Vietnam.  They built this Island to be a prison, where they would keep thousands of communist vienamese in shackles.  The french made “tiger cages” which allowed them to look down at the prisoners and throw lye and sewage on them.  Many of the prisoners rebelled and some even escaped, however from the 1500’s to the 1970’s this Island served as a prison.  Later, in 1970 the United States built its own set of prisons to torture their prisoners.  This is a very sad and very integral part of the island.  Many of the buildings the french built (using prison labor) are still standing and many residents actually live in those buildings.  We have not yet visited the prisons, which is a tourist attraction, but we understand that it is very disturbing and interesting at the same time.  Sometimes, actual prisoners will come to visit.  Just last week a group of older gentlemen were staying at our hotel and we later learned that they were prisoned here at Con Dao.  Apparentley, many ex-prisoners still live here along with the vietnamese who used to be prison wardens.  We have been told that the prisoners do not hold grudges against the french or the americans or the vietnamese who held them against there will.  Rob and I agree that we are not treated badly at all by this group of people who were so horribly treated by our government.  We have been treated very friendly by the locals.

Still, we have much to see on the island and we now have a group of folks we’ve been hanging out with.  They are from Denmark and Sweden and they are very friendly.  Today is Magnus’s birthday and we’ll be celebrating with folks a little later.

Even though the island was known by the prisoners as “earthly hell”, the asthetic beauty is breathtaking.  There are so many wild fruit trees, as well as wild plumeria trees.  Palm jackfruit, mango, coconut and papaya trees are everwhere!  A real tropical paradise.  Life has almost slowed down to a stop here, and many locals spend the day lounging in their hammocks.  There area a few restaurants, but these consist of 4 walls made of tin siding.  We have learned that most families have their restaurant in the front of their house and employ their children.  There is no shortage of chickens, rosters, dogs and cats.  Also, there is a very gnarly spider species that lives in the trees!  Yuck!  Many farms dot the island, so fruit and vegetables are plentiful and fresh.  And as you can imagine, all types of fish to eat.  We’ve been well feed and have seen things we will never forget. 

This posting begins the travels and adventures of Heather & Rob - aka Taffy n Ray.  Yeeehaaaw!

Of course we waited until the last minute to create this blog that will track our journey for the next couple of years, so don’t expect any fancy pics or funny posts just yet. 

We leave for Ho Chi Minh City early Wednesday Morning (April 5) and after a 20 hour flight we’ll land in extreme heat and humidity!  Luckily, we’ll spend the first three months of our trip island hopping and avoiding monsoon.  First is Con Dao, then Phu Quoc and then who knows?  The plan is to stay in Southeast Asia for at least six months, go to Bali to meet some friends and then to Austrailia and New Zealand.  Yeah!

Tam Biet.