Day 59 of The Big Adventure, according to Sarah. 
Our alarms went off at 6.30am as we were due to catch the bus to Phong Nha. It was very early and we were all still very tired. We headed downstairs for a quick breakfast before getting on our bus. We’d been hoping for another bus with lie down seats, but no such luck. 

We were infact on a tour bus that was doing day trips from Hue to the Phong Nha caves. There was lots of excitable Asians, all ready and raring for their excursion, and then there was sleepy old us. 

We tried to get some sleep on the bus but the seat were not comfortable and the aircon wasn’t great. 

About 4 hours in the journey the bus began making a very funny noise and so we pulled over to the side of the road. The driver got out to assess the situation and announced that we had not one, but two flat tyres. 

So we sat there for about an hour while they tried to fix it and eventually we were on the move again. 

We arrived into Phong Nha around 2/3pm and checked into our hostel: Easy Tiger. 

I hadn’t realised how small Phong Nha was… But it turned out that Easy Tiger was essentially the only hostel in the town and was therefore very popular. 

We waited in reception to be shown up to our room and met a blonde haired boy named Reuben. 

We were all shown up to our dorms (Reuben was on a different floor to us, Bye Reuben). The dorms had two bunk beds in each and a private bathroom and considering there were 3 of us, it was essentially a private room. 

The beds were big, with big cosy blankets over them (in a fetching leopard print) and there was a little balcony. All in all, a very nice room. I was just worried for the forth person who was going to have to share with us, God help them if they were a boy. 

We settled in and had some showers and headed down to the pool area (yes, there was a pool) for a spot of lunch. 

Parker and Freya both had some rather gourmet sandwhiches and I had a lovely cobb salad. Very good food. 

Then we donned our bikini and we to lie in the big inflatable rings in the pool. It was rather intimidating at first as there were quite a few people at the pool and they all seemed to be in little cliques and know each other and we felt distinctly like outsiders. Thank god we had each other. 

After some nice pool time we decided to head out and explore the town a bit as we hadn’t really got a feel for it when we’d been dropped off that morning. 

It turned out to be just one road, lined with mostly hotels, a few stalls selling Oreos and crisps and of course a karaoke bar or three (which looked suspiciously like someone’s living room with a big tv). 

We walked down to the tourist centre and bought Freya some new flip flops and we all got a fish ice cream (my absolute FAV). 

Having seen that there really wasn’t much to the town, we decided to was back to the hostel and try to plan the next days activities.

We asked at reception about the different tours they offered to the caves and tried to decide. We saw on the wall that they did a daily talk at 9am about the caves and what was in the area and decided we’d get up in time for that and we’d decide then. 
Our stomachs were grumbling at this point so we got changed and headed out for dinner across the road. Parker and I shared some stir fried veggies and some vegetable curry, both of which were highly disappointing. Freya had some chicken and lemongrass stir fry which she said was highly enjoyable. 

We were all rather tired after our long day and when we headed back to the hostel we could see that the place was packed with people drinking and socialising and there was even live music. But we all decided we were too tired and couldn’t face the whole ‘where are you from? Where are you going? Where have you been?’ questioning and headed up to bed.