Nick's Day 5 - Nha Trang - The Beachiest Boom Boom

Night Before: [So last night out on the town we were approached probably a thousand times and asked if we wanted the "Boom Boom?". This was later translated to us as to mean "sex". Thats right I have officially decided that my sons will never come to Nha Trang. Coming in at a close second to the sex offers were the drug offers. I feel the Nha Trang is swiftly becoming the Amsterdam of Asia, but I may rebut this statement as such that we have yet to hit Laos, Cambodia, or Thailand which according to passing backpackers are "FAR MORE LIBERAL.."]


Ok, now I know that it is still early but this city is AMAZING!! Picturesque turquoise blue water ebbing gently against a white sand beach bordered by a boulevard of busy summertime scooters against a large resort town skyline. Things here are once again very cheap and friendly. Matt and I kick off the day by strolling down town and sampling some of Vietnam's famous slow drip coffee. This coffee is made by placing grounds in a strainer and pouring in about a shot of water in the top (see picture). The drip process takes about 2 hours to produce one shot of unbelievable coffee. Being that it takes so long many Vietnamese can be found sitting on stools in the street sipping on Vietnamese tea and waiting for their coffee. After our long breakfast we could not fight the urge to rent scooters again and IN THE CITY!! So we found a shop were they rented scooters for $3 a day and we set off. Nick's Day 5 - Boom Boom?

After the quaint conversation with the ex-pat the night before we had a few key destinations to hit. First stop, the giant white buddha, this was cool, we went in to a buddist temple and spoke with a 90 year old monk who thought I was Bin Laden (because of the beard) he granted us luck and he told me that "when you die, on your deathbed, you will receive total consciousness." So I got that goin' for me, which is nice. We lit some candles in celebration of buddhas up-coming birthday and for luck. All was going well until right before we made our accent to see his holiness; four young "tour guides" blocked our path and refused to move until we bought a book of post cards for $50. Now, in all fairness they were orphan's and had just given us a 3 minute mini-tour and all the proceeds were going to pay for their school supplies. Unfortunaitly they were begging the two most frugal tourists in Vietnam at the time so we pulled out our famous salvo bargining skills and brought them down to 2 dollars.... Don't judge. So we made it up to the Buddha while debating where the ethics of buddism have gone. It was amazing, and instantly made me want to convert. The temple on whole was extremely peaceful and serene. After, we ate delicious Chinese balls for lunch at the monastery where to my great embarrassment I completely smashed the chair I was sitting in. It just shattered and broke the serene silence that was the buddist prayer time. Next we took our bikes way out in search of an isolated beach that we never found but the winding drive along the coast was spectacular. Now we had an afternoon to kill before our overnight bus so we got our suits and headed to the main beach. It wasn't packed but the bodies there weren't too hard on the eyes. We swam in the luke warm water sat out one the white sand and turned down every vender that came our way. I was even slapped by one because I didn't want to buy any gum! Once we were good and burnt we hopped back on our scooters and rode all the way out to the point to sip beer and watch the sunset over the city and watch the city lights come on. On the way back in the dark we had issues. I went the wrong way on a one way highway and matt caused a elderly gentleman to spin out of control and go flying off his scooter into on coming traffic. It was ok though because the Vietnamese were used to this and just swerved around him. Finally we made it to our bus which to our surprise ment that we would be sleeping on top of each other for the next 15 hours. Oh great....