Exploring Nha Trang

It was a long walk from the train station to the hotel when we arrived in Nha Trang and it was pretty late so we werent really taking much of the area in. We noticed the endless streets of hotels and a few places with Russian names but that was about it. The next morning however it was instantly clear how much of a holiday destination this place really was, and for one country in particular. Almost every restaurant and shop name was translated in Russian. Every menu had an English version as well as a Russian. And the beach was full of Russian tourists. It was actually quite funny, as a few times when we would walk down the street, the hosts from restaurants would instantly speak in Russian to us and even the Vietnamese shop owners would say thank you to us in Russian. It was almost always assumed that if you were a tourist, that was where you were from.

You could see what attracted people to the area, as there were a lot of nice hotels and the beach stretched for miles with sun lounges and parasols almost the entire length. It didn't really match the beaches in the Philippines and we definitely didn't like having to pay a fee just to sit on the beach, but since getting to Vietnam it was the first place we had been to on the coast so we wanted to make the most of it before heading back inland. There was an endless choice of restaurants, serving all types of cuisine (we even managed to find a really nice Greek restaurant one night) and there were ice cream parlours on almost every street.

The following day we organised to go on another boat trip. People had told us that diving and snorkelling wasn't as good in Vietnam but we were actually pleasantly surprised. The water was clear and there were plenty of colourful fish to see. The best part though was actually the lunch they provided. The tour guide started bringing out the plates of vegetables, rice and noodles and it seemed never ending. Plate after plate after plate kept coming, and the table was full. We ate up and then there was time for either another swim around or chance to sunbathe on the upper deck. On the way back, a variety of fruit was then brought out for us. Definitely got our money's worth in food alone.

Boat trip lunch

We didnt fancy doing another tour sat on a coach all day or island hopping so we set out on our own to find some of the more local sites. We caught a local bus about 10 minutes north to the Po Nagar Cham Towers, which are some ancient temples still used for workshop even today. They were impressive to see and there was a nice view overlooking the city. Next we decided to walk to the Long Son Pagoda, a Buddhist Temple, that had a giant white Buddha at the top of what felt like hundreds of stairs.

A local lady showing her craft

Sean stealing my pose

We felt like we'd gotten what we could out of Nha Trang so were researching where to head to next when Sean noticed Dalat, a place known for its waterfalls. We had kind of bypassed it from going on the train but it was only a couple of hours away by bus so we decided to go spend a few days there next.

:)