Vung Tau

26.04.2009 - 28.04.2009 30 °C

As much as I love Saigon, I really couldn’t wait to escape the claustrophobic heat, and so after 4 days we boarded an old Soviet ‘death trap’ of a Hydrofoil for the hour long voyage to Vung Tau.

Ben and I had been to Vung Tau about 3 years ago and loved it as it was more of a local Vietnamese hang out with the odd Australian expat going there to relive the Heyday of the war.
The boat ride was fairly calm until we reached the open water of the China Sea and once the locals start standing up and looking at why the boat is almost on its side, you better start looking at where the emergency (or lack thereof) exits really are.
Of course, inevitably, we were fine but I was one very glad person to be off the boat swearing never to get on one again.
Vung Tau was everything we remembered it to be, except that last time we were here we had hired a moto for Ben and I to commute the scenic 6km between the back beach and the town. This time around, I stuck to my Loral’s and said that we should really only go by bicycle with Tom. Off Ben went in search of a bike and came back with a tandem plus a rack at the back for Tom to sit on. We were certainly a sight on our tandem walking up and riding down the hills of Vung Tau. I didn’t realise how difficult a tandem actually was to ride as the front and back person pedal on opposite sides and having a 25kg added weight on the back didn’t really help matters.
I’m not sure if it was the tandem, or my not agreeing to hiring a moto that made Ben decide that Vung Tau was not offering everything it had last time and after 2 days it was time to move on.

View of Vung Tau back beach from our room