Mui Ne Beach

Open Tour bus picked me up near my hotel in Saigon, took around 5 hours to get to the beach, so was not to bad. Nice sunny day as well. Arrived in Mui Ne at around 1pm and checked into the same bungalow place as Val was staying at. Spent the rest of the day swimming and having a wander along the beach strip which is fairly long. Val told me about the nearby sand dunes which she had visited in the morning. Went out for a drink that night at a local bar, a few tourists were out and about which was good.

Hired a motorbike and set out early to the dudes, in Vietnam it pays to park your moto in safe parking which costs around 2000 dong, which I did at the first dudes which were made of a nice red sand. Hired a few kids to show me around and take me sand boarding. Was fun, got sand everywhere. The kids took some good photos of me sliding down the slopes as well. Had nice views of the surrounding area from the dunes as well. Payed the kids, payed my parking, got my helmet back (yes I was actually wearing one Mum) and headed onwards along the coast to the next site which is the Red Canyon which is pretty nice, a weird formation of red sandstone carved out by the elements. Then onwards along way up the road to the White Sand Dunes. The ride was special, very pretty scenery along the way, dunes on the left with beaches, islands and the ocean on the right. Had the road almost to myself as well. Found the white dunes after a bit of looking around and did the same as the red dunes. Then it was the ride back into town of about 20km.

Met up with Val for lunch and then took the bike into Phan Tiet (168,000 pop), the big town near Mui Ne and then South along highway 1 (once I figured out which way to go) heading to Ta Cu mountain, after some sketchy traffic we got there in one piece and caught the Austrian built cable car up the mountain, where we checked out the large reclining Buddha which is 49m long. We were the only Westerners on the mountain which was cool. The views from the cable car were great as well. Started to rain on the way back, not good, almost got taken out a couple of times as well. crazy braking maneuvers combined with zealous use of the horn were required. Made it home alive with no injures but ill think twice before riding on the highway again. To much to deal with, cows, bicycles, trucks, buses, cars all on a 2 lane road, motos and bicycles are meant to use the verge but with so many variances in speed its hard. Undertaking trucks is freaky as well. Went out again that night but was pretty tired so came home early. Booked a bus to Dalat, a town North West of Mui Ne in the highlands.