?? to ?? - 4th July 2009

I woke fairly late this morning, but we still managed to be off by about 9am. For breakfast I had jam on french bread which was tasty, and the best coffee I've ever tasted!
Hue hadn't had breakfast, so we stopped at 11am so he could get something to eat. I wasn't hungry yet, so settle for another coffee. The cafe we'd stopped at had some nice artwork in it, and a dog whos tail was offside; a bit random!
We passed screaming kids, waving madly as I passed! It's so adorable! I have to make sure my hands are free as I feel a bit rude if I'm sitting on them and don't wave back at them!
The sights along the way were spectacular; waterfalls, deep valleys, lush greenary, beautifully shaped mountains... the houses fitted in very naturally. We even passed a mud house, like they have in Nicaragua.
We stopped again, and I had some fresh mango and another coffee. Each stop we make, I have to reapply lashings of sun guard as my hands are on their way to being pink, overnight they calm a bit, but after a days riding, they're not looking so healthy. Thankfully my nose is looking a bit better and wasn't as bad as I'd first thought. I decided to wear just shorts today for a brief period of time; my knees became quite burnt in that time, and I had to cover up again! My sun lotion looks like salad cream which is a bit disturbing, but it smells quite nice thankfully!
It rained very slightly today, but not to the extent it did previously which was a relief. On the way, we'd passed a toppled over vehicle with the window all smashed up. Thankfully I think that everyone had gotten out of the van okay, as there was a group looking either chilled out or in shock (not sure which!) and didn't seem to be that bothered about anyone being hurt. There was also evidence of a vehicle having gone over the side of the road down the mountain quite recently.
We arrived at the hotel in good time. I got a whole chalet to myself quite was rather plush! It looked very nice and came with a TV with BBC news 24, a music channel and an English movie channel which made me happy!
I spent the next few hours relaxing in the room, and lying down (balancing precautiously) on a ledge to the entrance to my chalet, whilst reading my book, which I managed to finish! The bar in the hotel had recently had some renovations done, and this was the grand opening today, so they had live acts on from when we arrived to mid evening, it was nice to hear music, although it was more like noise, as the singer wasn't particularly tuneful!
Dinner was next; coffee and noodles with veg! The celery in the noodles wasn't too nice, but the noodles themselves were delicious. Hue and I had a nice wee chat; I think I was feeling a bit more talkative! After it being hard to talk on the motorbike, I often still feel quiet when we stop during the day for a drink. Also I tend to think a lot whilst we're zooming along, so I'm still pondering on things.
I then pottered off to the internet cafe where I spent a few hours chatting. On my way back, it was pretty dark, apart from lighting from nearby cafes, which led the path back to the hotel. A group of boys decided they'd have fun and urinate whilst walking, which was rather unpleasant, and I thought that was the sort of behaviour to be found in Thurso or Wick; not a quiet town in Vietnam!