I enjoyed my visit to Dong Hoi. Everything went to plan, unlike my visit to Ninh Binh and I had two days or riding a moped around the Phong Nha-Ke Bang National Park.

I arrived in Dong Hoi at about 05:30 in the morning, having been thrown around comprehensively by the night bus. I left the night bus feeling thoroughly dissatified, having spent most of it analysing the situation that I had been presented with in Ninh Binh, having not faced anything like it in the past. I left the bus, after trying to get them to show me where the bus station was, but had to speak to a woman in what looked like a booking office, which happened to be open. She reluctantly gave me the directions to the bus station and having been lying down for the last 7.5 hours, I decided to walk there.

I got to the bus station and the woman in there attempted to explain that I actually needed another bus station, which was 2 Km away. This she didn’t do a very good job of, as I could understand the diagram but didn’t know why I had to go to this place that was 2 Km away, but luckily a helpful bystander stepped in and explained that it was another bus station. I walked outside and got a motorbike taxi (xe om) to the next bus station. There I asked when the next bus to Son Trach was, but that answer I got was “14:00”, meaning that I would have to wait 6 hours. I think the bus drivers were on holiday for Tet, but I walked outside where I found my original xe om driver and got him to take me there for 250 000 VND.

The ride was about 1.5 hours and we passed some spectacular scenery in the meantime, but I was glad to get to Son Trach, as the motorbike hadn’t been built for long journeys. Once there I called the Phong Na Farmstay, which had provided me with advice when in Ninh Binh and they explained that the Jungle Bar was the place to go. I got back on the motorbike and the driver took me there.

In the Jungle Bar I met a German guy, who was only in Son Trach for a day and wanted to rent a motorbike. Still dazed from the overnight bus journey, I agreed to go with him and dumped my stuff in the nearest hotel. I think the German guy (who I can’t remember the name of) was getting slightly frustrated towards the end, as I kept delaying him with trips to get lunch and sun cream, but he was very polite about it. We got about 2 Km down the road and then my bike cut out. After re-starting it with the manual kick-start, we got another 1 Km before it cut out again. I called the bloke who had rented us the bikes and he came out and couldn’t find a problem.

After getting to Paradise Cave, both me and the German walked inside, but decided to split up as I was going a lot slower than he was. He offered me a cookie and that was the last I saw of him. I spent the rest of the day walking around the Paradise Case and trying to get home, one a motorcycle that kept cutting-out. Luckily I found out that if you left it for a bit and then tried to start it manually, it worked, but only on the 3rd attempt did it stay running for any period of time. I got back to the hotel as it was getting dark and decided to swap the bike for another one the next day.

The next day was spent riding down part of the Ho Chi Minh trail, which I enjoyed immensely. It was totally deserted with a two-lane concrete path leading through the jungle and around the hills in the national park. The only people I saw for 40 Km were the people in the patrol stations and 1 other foreigner who waved as he went past in the opposite direction on his bike.

Getting back to the hotel fairly early, I got something to eat and planned my next journey to Dong Ha. This involved getting up early for a local bus which would take me directly to Dong Ha bus station.