Such a stunning view on the drive to Da Lat. the scenery was a mix of small Vietnamese towns amidst green forest and French inspired buildings. When we arrived we could have been in a village in France. The weather was colder and the air was fresher. The roads however were as crazy as the streets in Ho Chi Minh City. We stayed in a pretty dirty hostel where I woke up with a bug in my bed in the morning, but it didn’t matter because we spent most of the days out on a scooter exploring the waterfalls and nearby villages.
We decided to go to Da Lat after seeing pictures of elephant falls and datanla falls. The pictures made it look like paradise. Unfortunately they were not so accurate. Still impressive but the areas were littered by rubbish left behind by tourists and locals. We are quite disappointed by the shear lack of care for the environment. We have seen on multiple occasions people throwing empty plastic bottles, bags and food wrapping from buses straight onto the road and boats straight into the ocean.
We did a three hour hike to the top the mountain on the first day, I realised how unfit I am and am now rather worried about our hike to Everest base camp. The top of the mountain was swarming with tourists who caught the jeeps to the top instead of hiking. We had read there was an peak with less people but after taking a few wrong turns we must of missed it. We had a young family we were following up the mountain because they were local and we gathered they knew where we were going, we only found out 3/4 of the way up that they were in fact following us.
The best part was on the way back down a local group of men called us over and offered us a warm beer ( because having a cold beer seems to be unheard of here). None of them spoke English and since we don’t speak French or Vietnamese we just sat around making hand signals and laughing awkwardly.
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