Nha Trang

After that last adventure regarding the train everything else has run quite smoothly…maybe apart from my dad getting attacked by a monkey! (more about that later).

To all the lovely people who have been leaving comments thank you we get so excited (if you are choosing the anonymous option, if you would like us to know who you are just sign off with your name at the end of the comment).

On the first day here in Nha Trang Matt hired a motorbike…so all 4 of us squash onto the bike and go cruising, it’s the best! You feel independent, the wind in your hair exploring the sights its fantastic…the kids absolutely love it. We’ve been going from one end to the other, past towns, cruising along their tiny streets. You wisk past and you get little glimpses of their way of life. Everyone is outside and the front of their houses are open, so you get to see everything…from ladies lazing on their hammocks, men playing cards outside drinking coffee to the local barber cleaning some man’s ears!

When you book a tour here, you really don’t always know what it will entail…we all decided to go with a private car which actually worked out cheaper, the guide would take us to monkey Island and to the most beautiful beach, with white sand and a seafood market! Sounded really good so we booked it for the following day. The car with guide (which is actually the man that was in the office the previous day that sold us the package, he is also driving and he is our guide…it’s a one man show…which is cool) picks us up at 9am. We first arrive at Monkey Island, my mum is already on edge because we have to get a wooden boat to the Island and is reminded of a bad experience in Hoi Anh, where she nearly tipped the small boat over! And in the car on the way the guide starts to tell us how careful we need to be with the monkeys, don’t go near them and make sure you have no food with you, especially the kids, they like small children. Well…mum and I are having a heart attack in the back seat and nearly refuse to go…but we all get on the boat and arrive. There are monkeys everywhere, I grab Ashah and Matt keeps Alex close. We have to run because the monkey circus has already started and we are late, so we have to run through the grass area and dodge the wild monkeys. When we arrive at the circus show… the monkeys in the show break our hearts, they are cute and do amazing tricks but not good to see animals in a circus like that.

The guide takes us for a walk towards the most disgusting smell…and in the way my dad decides to pull out a plastic bag with his unfinished roll…well, what can  I say one monkey in an instant jumps on him rips the bag and takes the roll and runs off, but the rest of us have jumped a mile, all the monkeys  began to encircle us looking and smelling for food, I was packing my pants… the guide pressed on…was I glad to get off that island!

The adventure continued… the beautiful white beach he spoke of, was not so beautiful, and the seafood market was not what we expected, we were the first customers in 2 months, it was their low season, it was raining so we were swarmed by about 20 ladies almost jumping in our car when we arrived…and we are not sure why… we were told that they were all trying to sell us their seafood…Although we were a bit thrown we did laugh about it later, and made some genuine friends along the way.

We caught up with Matt’s first cousin Tony, he’s working here managing a few restaurants we had a meal it was really good quality food. It’s always nice to see a familiar face.

Alexander would also like to say a special hello to Luca his school friend, and thank you very much for all your messages, Alex loves reading them.