We figured NaTrang would be the last stop together before the Boyans departed. It took us a while to figure out how our last week would play out. Should we take a bus and stop in Dalat or take the train direct from HCMC? (We gave in and flew). Since we scrapped the beginning part of the Thailand itinerary, we thought the Boyans might leave Vietnam early and try some of the southern Thai beaches, perhaps with a direct flight to Phuket. (There were no such logistically convenient flights).
The Boyans were hoping for some good diving conditions on the coast. The girls wanted more beach time (which would potentailly be our last). So we ended up spending 5 days in Nha Trang. The Boyans would leave 2 days later after getting a dive in. Gratefully, they offered to take a bit of our cast-a-way luggage and souvenirs so we don't have to carry them for 4 more weeks.
Our major take-aways from Nha Trang were that it is overrun with Russian tourists. We hadn't heard anything about this, but it is, in fact, a thing. Secondly - the beach is overrun with trash. A steady stream of plastic floats in with every wave. (We did encounter 2 travellers a week later that had stayed less than a mile down shore, who oddly reported that their beach was clean.)
We were annoyed with our lodging situation at "Holi Beach Apartments" inside the Maple Hotel. The room itself was nice and even had a balcony washing machine and a kitchenette. However it was an arrangement where some apartments had taken a few floors of a larger hotel. The hotel pool was only available to us for a relatively high day-fee. The Boyan's apartment was nearly as large as ours but was less than half the price of our room. We just felt that the overall value was disproportionate to the enjoyment we had in Nha Trang. Jeff and I can do with generally less beach time (ugh SAND and SUNBLOCK, yuck), so we're a hard sell on this city.
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| On the first full day we checked out the Cham Towers (above left) and Long Son Pagoda (right and below) |
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| We managed to get Grandpa to have street food on tiny stools with us once. |
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The Boyans treated us to a snorkeling trip with Vietnam Active to Hon Mun Island and Madonna Rock. After our Cambodian experience and the amount of trash on the mainland of Nha Trang, we had low expectations that Vietnamese sea life would compare to our Caribbean standards. We were pleasantly surprised. Clarity was good and the reef-life was colorful. We saw many blue sea stars, lots of parrot fish, and some specimens that even the crew of Exit Strategy didn't commonly encounter. This was the first time Genna truly snorkeled, rather than freaking out and reverting to goggles. She loved it and loudly narrated her findings through her tube the whole time. Thank goodness for the wet suits they provided. The water was a bit chilly and Genna was quite purple by the end of the day. The Boyans booked themselves for a dive in the same area for another day.
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| One weird encounter we had was at Hon Chong Promontory. Some sources we read mentioned that you could snorkel off this point around these picturesque boulders. Lonely Planet said that locals dive off the rocks. Maya and I love to jump off cliffs and all of us love snorkeling (which was lacking at most ALL of the beaches we'd been to on this trip). However when we got there, no one was swimming. We disrobed, masked up, and planned to jump in and immediately got tweeted at by the guards. NO SWIMMING! So we thought we'd climb around these boulders for a while before leaving for the approved adjacent beach. TWEET! TWEET! No climbing on the rocks!!! You must stay on the maintained pathway. They didn't speak English so we could neither argue, reason with, or wrench an explanation from the guards. Perhaps they had a good reason to ban swimming like there could be unexploded ordinances in the bay or they were protecting the (drab) reef (probably not). So we momentarily retreated, then the girls made a break for some offshore boulders to explore while leaving the dads to porter our belongings to the beach. We made like Dori (just keep swimming, just keep swimming), don't look back, ignore the tweeting. However, it took Dad and Jeff so long to catch up with us at the beach we feared they had been detained on our behalf. |
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| The last beach day ALL the girls tried out the inflatable playground. |
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