Phong Nha – 19th & 20th March

On the morning of Tuesday 19th March Captain Caveman and I had breakfast at Diep Le Homestay as it was included in the room rate. We’d booked online for 8 nights and the room cost was just less than 300,000VND (£9.53) per night for a family room. The bed was comfortable but I don’t think either of us had slept as well as we could’ve done. I was pleased that there was more than one pillow each though. The window didn’t close well so there were a few mosquitos in the bedroom. I took antihistamines so that the bites I had were not a problem. Captain Caveman had omelette with bread and black coffee for his breakfast while I went for the veggie noodles and green tea. Mine tasted like it had butter in it which I wasn’t a fan of but there was plenty of bak choy in the dish.
Next, we borrowed one of the free bicycles from Diep Le and went to Oxalis where Captain Caveman had more coffee and I had a mango smoothie. Captain Caveman left for his Son Doong trip at 9am and would be gone for the next 4 days. Despite the news yesterday he remained in good spirits and was optimistic. He appeared to be far less worried about the future than I was! I had packed him some of my homemade fruitcake and a noggin of cheese for him to have at Camp 1.
I had a lunch date with Chung but had to move it to the evening as I didn’t know if my stomach would be better. I wasn’t sure what had caused it but I didn’t feel too well. I had a veggie pho packed with vegetables and tofu, at The Villa’s, to see how that helped but my stomach was still iffy all afternoon. I paid 110,000VND (£3.49) for my massive bowl of noodle soup and a pot of Jasmine tea.
At dinner time I was definitely feeling hungry so I met my old friend, Chung, at Phong Nha Vegan. We had an absolute feast of roasted peanuts, mushrooms in Lalot leaf, veggie fried rice, fresh spring rolls, a pineapple & carrot juice and a ginger tea with red apple. The spring rolls were the best I’ve had yet, the mushrooms are my favourite dish and it was just a really great dinner. I was pleased to see Chung again and the Lazy Ladies Club (LLC) was back together again. I paid the bill which was an absolute bargain of 260,000VND (£8.26) for the two of us. I cycled back to Diep Le Homestay for an early night, half expecting to be ill again but I was fine. I got ready for bed and then started to mull over some ideas. I’d been thinking of starting my own business now that I was out of work, but perhaps Captain Caveman and I could do something together for 2025. I got my notepad out and started making a list, by the time I went to sleep I had drafted out quite a business idea to put to Captain Caveman when he got back from the cave on Friday.

Wednesday 20th March was the day of the 2nd (Not so) Fat Club meeting that I had been away from. I had no idea what my weight was as there are no scales at the homestay we are staying in. I did take a note of my measurements and wasn’t optimistic as I’d consumed 302 syns this week. To my surprise, I had lost 1cm from my bust and hips and 2cm from my waist. At 6am it was only 17°C, a bit rainy and 97% humidity so I was quite chilly.
For breakfast at Diep Le Homestay I tried the banana pancake which came with chocolate sauce on and was cooked in some type of margarine. I had a bad stomach as soon as I’d eaten it, which didn’t surprise me.
In the afternoon I was invited to join Veronika at The Villa’s where she was going to be staying for a couple of nights and had some birthday champagne she had been saving. The evening was really lovely, I ate salami and prawn pasta which was great but did come with a chilli in despite me saying no chillies. Luckily I spotted it and the staff did offer to get me a new one. I spent just 260,000VND (£8.22) and was on 51 syns for the day.