Phong Nha – 18th May

On Thursday 18th May, after not much sleep as I was finding it hard to adjust to the heat, I cycled Bluey to Victory Road Villas (VRV) again. I had an orange juice, a pot of Jasmine tea and a litre of water to keep hydrated. I decided to have the beef noodle soup (Pho Bo) for breakfast today. It wasn’t quite as good as the chicken one but still did the trick. I got on with work but at 2.45pm there was a power cut to the whole of the town. I was very lucky that VRV had a generator so we didn’t have to wait long until the electricity was back on. I took a brief look outside by the river, it was hot, there wasn’t any breeze and I was struggling acclimatising. I ordered a fruit salad with yoghurt and muesli for a late lunch, with a Bang soda. The fruit salad had banana, watermelon, mango and dragon fruit in and was very refreshing in the heat. Even in the AC dining room, it was 29°C and I was constantly too hot.
I went back to work until 7pm when I decided to relax with a fresh coconut juice and check my Facebook/messages etc. Rather than go home, I stayed at The Villa’s restaurant for dinner and a glass of red wine. I chose the penne carbonara and it tasted lovely but I suspected it had a bit too much oil in for it to be diet friendly. I then completely blew the diet by having the chocolate brownie with ice cream. I gave myself the excuse that I needed to try it again to check if it was still as good as I remembered – it was!

My bill for the day at The Villa’s was as follows:
Orange juice 60,000
Pho Bo 75,000
Pot of Jasmine tea 50,000
Bang soda 25,000
Fruit salad, yoghurt & muesli 95,000
Fresh coconut 50,000
Glass of red wine 90,000
Penne carbonara 200,000
Brownie 100,000
Total cost 745,000vnd (£24.72).

I thought that was a bargain considering what I’d had, and I had been there all day.
I got ready to cycle home, I had no bike lights and had not realised that the power cut was still happening.
I was a bit nervous cycling with it being so dark and I went very slowly. I’d not gone far when a motorbike came up behind me and was following me really slowly. I tried to look to see what was happening, only to see it was the one eyed cleaning lady from Jungle Boss. She was riding passenger with her husband, holding a baby and was  shouting me. There was obviously nothing wrong with the eye that had not been lost in a bomb explosion! We both got off our bikes and hugged, it was so good to bump in to Tửu like this. She speaks no English but was trying to tell me something, so beckoned over someone she knew from a property nearby and asked her to translate for me. They said that if I cycled slowly I would be ok, and not to be scared of the dark because the power was back on at the Glass House. Tửu’s husband then followed me a bit with the light of his motorbike to make sure I didn’t inadvertently cycle over a snake or into a cow (not common but it does happen).
When I got home I was so sweaty that I had a shower, luckily the water temperature was cooler again now that it was dark. The tank on the exposed roof gets so hot that we have to time when to shower, when the water is not going to be scorching hot. My eczema was not liking the heat and humidity, it was definitely starting to flare up even worse. I went to bed early and was looking forward to Captain Caveman returning tomorrow.