Day 51 of The Big Adventure, according to Sarah 
We woke up early because we’d planned to see a bit more of Dalat before getting the bus to Nha Trang that afternoon.

Parker had read that there was an enjoyable cable car where you could get great views of the town. 

He hopped in a taxi and headed straight there.

It appeared we were the first ones there, so we bought our tickets and squeezed into a cable car. 

It felt so strange to be in a cable car without skis! 

We soared above a large pine forest (who would have thought this climate was perfect for pine?!) and past the town towards a monestry on a hill. 

It was all very picturesque and we wandered around the grounds and took advantage of the many photo ops. 

By this time, our stomachs were grumbling rather lousy so we decided to head back into town to find some breakfast. 

We’d found that a lot of the highly rated eateries in Dalat were cafes 

(ca phé in Vietnamese – the French influence is definitely noticeable), so we went to the #1 cafe in Dalat. 

We found a nice table upstairs and ordered Eggs Benedict and French toast. Thankfully this Eggs Benedict was the real deal and could not have been more different to the one we’d had in Cheeky Monkeys all those weeks ago. After a very hearty breakfast, it was time to head back to the hotel to pack up our stuff and catch a bus to the next city on our tour of Vietnam: Nha Trang. We checked out of the hotel and said many many thanks to the lovely receptionist who had been so unbelievably lovely. 

She then walked with us to the end of the road to wait with us to check we got on our bus ok – such a sweetheart! 

We said our goodbyes and got on the bus. 

The drive to Nha Trang took about 4 hours through some very mountainous, jungly terrain. It was one of the most enjoyable bus rides and we all loved watching the amazing scenery whizzing past our windows. I’m pretty sure this would have been one of the roads Top Gear drove along on their tour of Vietnam and I thought of how much Daddy Clark would have loved this. 

We arrived at Nha Trang and found we were only a 10minute walk from our hostel: Dollar Hotel (sounds a lot glitzier than it was) and set off. After some slight confusion (Google maps isn’t exactly what you’d call accurate in some parts of Vietnam), we found the hotel and checked in. The hotel lobby appeared to double as their extended family’s living room. There were children playing on the floor, Grandpa sat there in his silk pyjamas and the TV was on. 

It wasn’t exactly a warm welcome and they didn’t speak much English but we managed to struggle through and they showed us up to our room. 

Freya and Parker had been dying to get to a beach destination so quickly changed into their bikinis, slapped on some suncream and headed out to the beach. Lauren and I weren’t quite such keen beans and decided to have a nice little snooze. 

The girls got back from the beach after the sun had gone down and declared it ‘nice, but nothing special’. 

We all showered and changed and looked up where would be good for dinner. 

Lanterns was just one block away and had some great reviews so we headed there. 

It was very busy but we managed to nab the last table for 4 in the back of the restaurant. 

Freya and Parker had some seafood noodles (not to mine and Lauren’s tastes, but apparently delicious), Lauren had some sautéed vegetables (she was on a ridiculous diet; don’t ask) and I had a beaut chicken coconut curry. 

The food lived up to all the great reviews and we all left feeling very full. We saw that they were advertising a free walking tour of the city everyday at 2pm and decided we’d do that tomorrow.
Freya’s friend, JoFo, had been to Vietnam before and had written us recommendations about where to go and what to do in each town (very helpful) and Nha Trang was apparently a Russian party town. How unlikely. 

After wandering the streets for a while, we saw that, indeed, many shops did have Russian signage and a lot of people we passed did seem to be speaking in Russian. We couldn’t help but wonder why the Russians had chosen Nha Trang as their go to party place/ holiday destination, but there was no doubt about it; pretty much all the tourists here were Russian. 

We decided to go to one of the bars JoFo had recommended called ‘Why Not’ .

They had free shots on arrival (maybe a good thing, maybe a bad thing) and we found a nice little table and ordered our first round of drinks. Much merriment ensued and great fun (along with a few tequila shots) was had by all. 

The gals decided to try and find the other bar that JoFo had recommended but I have never been a big drinker so headed home to bed. 

I got to the hostel to find the front door chained and padlocked closed. Oh good. 

After a few knocks, a lady (Grandma perhaps?) came to open the door and let me in. Lucky for me she was still awake, otherwise I would have had to kip on the doorstep. 
I headed up to bed and promptly fell asleep. Sometime around 3.30am the girls arrived home. I fell back to sleep almost instantly but i remember there being quite a commotion and many many packets of crisps.