Huế, Vietnam - Day 3 - to Danang, Vietnam

 Good Morning,

If only the "early to bed and early to rise" actually worked!

Finally I tried the pancakes withs fruit here at the homestay. I had been getting eggs. They offer many toppings including chocolate and fresh fruits. I am a fan of passion fruit so I got the pancakes with fresh passion fruit and honey topping. Very tasty.

Yesterday, I went walking in a new direction. That took me through a street of fruit and vegetable markets, then further into the neighborhood to look for a barber shop. 

I heard I could get a hair cut for under $1 usd. I just stopped in the first shop I saw, the haircut was more expensive, $1.60 usd. Definitely a close cut. She left the top longer and then tapered in the sides around my baldness. Why? I have no idea.

On the way back, I came across what I think is a pretty famous coffee shop. I ordered an salted egg coffee. This is the second time I had egg coffee. This one was delicious, had a bit of a caramel flavor.

I wandered around several streets in the neighborhood before heading back towards the home stay.

Unfortunately on the way I saw what looked like a pretty well stocked cell phone store with an assortment of tripods on display. I wanted to bring a tripod, but the one I had at home was too big. I found a nice small tripod at this store for just over $10 usd. On the way to Hue, I managed to lose another pair of earbuds, my 3rd set since leaving Mexico. I promised myself I wouldn't buy any more. I broke my promise to myself and besides the tripod I also bought aaanooother set of earbuds. I think the earbuds were falling out of the pockets of my travel trousers. I have a fanny pack with me. That will be the new home of my earbuds. I'll see if I can hold onto these for more than a week. The picture the seller took to demonstrate that the ear bud case could also be used to trigger picture on the cell phone camera. That is why I look so serious. I didn't have time to put on my happy face.

The restaurant that I have been eating at was only a couple stores down from the cell shop. I decided it was time to eat dinner.  This afternoon, I had some roasted chicken with all the included sides. A delicious meal. $1.25 usd

Later in the evening, like at 8:30 after charging the earbuds, I found that only one side was working. The problem was that I was scheduled to leave early today leaving little time to exchange them today. I decided to head over to the store after 8:30 hoping they stayed open late. Lucky for me, they did. Lucky for me, they also had more earbuds in stock and exchanged them for me. 

If I didn't get them exchanged last night, I would have been stressing all night.

A little side note. All the toilets I have used in Vietnam have all had a hand douche next to the toilet. All the toilets also had paper available. I remember when traveling 35 years ago, it was only a bucket of water next to the toilet, no paper. I have considered adding a douche nozzle at my place in Mexico. Now I am am more inclined to do that. 

Today I will be catching a train to Danang, a short 3 hour journey. 

I am mostly packed and ready to go. I will call a Grab taxi in about 30 minutes to go to the train station. I have too much baggage to use a Grab motor bike ride.

I arrived at the train station with plenty of time to spare and found a seat in the waiting area.

The staff gets everyone out on the train platform early and positioned according to train car assignment. There is a reason for this, the train doesn't waste time in the station.

I was the last to board in my car and I swear the train was moving as soon as my second foot was in the door. 

I booked a soft seat. Hard seats and sleeping berths are also available. This was a short trip, so I definitely didn't need a sleeper, but too long to endure a hard seat. The seats were very comfortable and reclinable.

I read that the left side of the train had a better view going over the mountain pass on the way. I was sitting on the right. I also read that this train might have a very basic dining car. I went looking for the dining car, I found it, found a seat at the table on the left side and ordered a drink and snack.

About an hour into the trip we got out of the suburban area and started traveling along the side of the Đầm Cầu Hai a lagoon off the East Sea (often referred to as the South China Sea).

Besides the train moving pretty fast, the windows of the train were pretty dirty and not good for taking pictures. 

The ride vultures were out in force when we arrived in Da Nang. One of them that approached me offered to take me to my new accomodation. I checked grab and the price he quoted was in line with the online price of Grab. He also spoke some English.

We went to his car that was parked nearby. I was surprised because he was driving a full size SUV. Once in the car, he produced his notebook of testimonials. I dismissed it. He got a chuckle and said, "you know about the notebooks". I said I did and that all the Grab drivers in Hue also had them. The drivers are happy to give you a short ride to your accomodations, but the prize is to have you book guided day trips with them. That's the real money. The notebooks are full of testimonials from past travellers that used them for a guide. I have not idea if the testimonials are real or fabricated.

I liked this driver. As it happens, this driver is not just a driver, he owns a tour company and has over 20 people working for him. This just happened to be a slow day for him so the train station is a good place to sell more tours. 

Along the way, he was wondering why I didn't book a place in the city in the tourist area. I didn't have an answer. It is hard to pick the perfect place to stay when booking online.

It was a 15 or 20 minute ride to my place. I paid the driver and he was on his way.

The bonus that I realized is that the place I booked is only 1 block from the beach. After I got checked in I walked to beach, a world class beach extending in either direction almost as far as I could see. Beautiful. I found a shady place to sit to enjoy the view of the ocean and beach.

It wasn't long before a young Vietnamese guy Phoom (I have no idea how to spell it) sat down near me and we started to chat, via Google translate. He works in a factory producing medical stuff. We sat for quite awhile. We chatted a lot. A little clunky switching back and forth between languages, but it worked. If I didn't say any thing for a few minutes and he had something to say, he would nudge me and point to phone. There were people on the beach pulling on a rope that extended into the ocean. I didn't realize it at the time the this was connected to one end of a very large net. There was another group pulling a rope far enough down the beach that I didn't even notice. There were only 4 fisherman, but other locals and tourist join in pulling in the net. At times there were as many as 10 people pulling on each end of the net. 

We were watching for close to an hour when Phoom says let go. By this time I realized it was a net and it was getting closer to shore.

Finally the last of the net is pulled onto shore and the fishermen (and fisherwomen) started picking the catch out of the net and sorting them in differt plastic tubs for different types of fish. Phoom said it was a small catch compared to yesterday. 

See a short video at:  

https://youtube.com/shorts/TZCtVoxPYmc?si=C1L0GIKNN6KMAeda

By now the group on the beach around the net really expanded. These were people that came to the beach to buy fish. One fisherwomen started selling fish while the other continued gathering the net to stow it for the next day.

I am sure all of the fish they caught today were sold before the were done.  

During the crush of people watching and looking at the fish. I lost Phoom, he must have gone home.

I will post more about the train ride soon. Check back later.