Tag: Vietnam

The King’s Highway Day 1: Amman – Madaba

Distance: 22.09 miles

Time: 2:42:55

Elevation: 1611 feet

Average Speed: 8.1 mph

Looking at today’s route out of Amman, I could tell that it wended its way over the hilltops – to avoid the busy roads on the valley floor. Still suffering with a bad cold, I considered opting out of the steep climbs, to try weaving in and out of the poorly flowing traffic instead. A brief spell in the traffic seemed alright, and I quite enjoyed the flow, reminding me of my exit out of Hanoi almost 4 years before.


But the route turned off sharply up ahead and I was also interested to see what the hills would be like. I passed through some narrow alleys where a colourful market was in full swing, then the road turned steeply to the left. I tried to engage my lowest gear, but one or two pedal revolutions later, the chain had slipped and I had to act fast to unclip before I toppled over. I’d installed a new rear derailleur just before I’d left, and although it seemed to be set up fine when tested on the flat roads near my home, it would appear that perhaps wasn’t the case.


I got up the first steep ramp in stages, but between the malfunctioning gears and the gradient, it hadn’t been pretty. Impatient to get moving I made some impromptu adjustments and kept on fighting up the hill. The road meandered higher and higher, reaching almost 1000 metres, the surroundings becoming less salubrious as I went. As I reached the summit of the first hilltop settlement, it felt impoverished and cut off, and when the afternoon call to prayer began reverberating around the buildings, I stopped and soaked in the atmosphere.


Back on a major road, I passed a variety of roadside cafes and food stalls, the roadsides were starting to feel like those in Vietnam, it was quite comforting after my ride there. I came across a large square and stopped to take photos of the Abu Darwish Mosque, a large building I’d seen on the skyline from the Citadel the day before. As I lingered a group of teenage boys walked by, they called out a welcome before one asked ‘if I liked Palestine’. What would Rishi say? I briefly considered, before thinking of something else.


The route kept off the main road from now on, cutting through sparse housing developments and up and over steep rises to keep moving forwards. Eventually the housing petered out and I was passing through farmland on a very quiet road. Stray dogs looked too bored to attack and kids looked on inquiringly


After working my way across the countryside for some miles, I realised I was close to my stop for the night, Madaba. Passing through the outer reaches, I tried to follow the route on the tiny screen of my GPS, in bright sunshine, making several missteps, and passing along roads that I doubted many tourists would usually encounter, before eventually arriving at the Black Iris Hotel.


While I paused before going inside, a large group of boys gathered around, seemingly interested in my bike, and the aforementioned GPS unit, and in good spirits. They had just asked me the age-old burning question of Messi or Ronaldo when the hotel proprietors came out to shoe them away. Messi I’d responded, which annoyed the boy who’d asked, but seemed to be appreciated by his friends. Well, the ones in Argentina tops anyway.


Checking into the Black Iris Hotel was a pleasant experience, so I elected to have dinner in the hotel. Being only a little after 4 o’clock, I had some time to spare, so deliberated between the 12 mile return trip over to Mount Nebo, which would afford views of Jerusalem and the Dead Sea, or to make a quick dash down to St George’s Greek Orthodox Church, home to the Madaba Map, a mosaic map known as being the earliest cartographic depiction of Jerusalem and the Holy Land, dating from the 6th Century AD.

The walled city of Jerusalem is at the centre of the image with the Dead Sea above that. Jordan itself would be above the Dead Sea but much has been lost.


Only being an hour left until sunset, I opted for the map. Unfortunately, the area that contained Madaba itself had been destroyed, but I did find Karak just on the edge of the remains, and that’s where I hoped to stop tomorrow.


As I made my way back from the church, I found the heart of Madaba to be very pleasant and slightly regretted opting to have dinner at the hotel. Passing by a very busy food counter, I noticed that they were selling Chicken Shawarma, and as it was the first place I’d spotted that did, I couldn’t help but try one. As it was dinner soon, I went small, at the princely sum of 67 pence. Simply prepared, I received a wrap with a light spreading of tahini sauce and thin slices of hot succulent chicken. It was very tasty, and I was pretty sure this would be better than what the hotel would provide.


Unsurprisingly I was right, but they did put on quite a feast, with soup, big bowls of hummus and baba ganoush, salads, kofta and rice and a chicken and potato stew. Following that was a big slab of baklava, which was very nice, but I particularly enjoyed washing it all down with a bottle of Petra Blonde Ale, as brewed in Jordan.

Epilogue

I arrived in Ho Chi Minh City on Monday afternoon, and didn’t fly out again until Thursday, it seemed like an extravagant amount of time in which to get ready. But, getting a bike box was a priority, and with the ongoing Tet celebrations, the predominance of closed shops was a concern. I considered cycling around the city checking out the various bike shops, but I decided I was ‘aff’ bikes for the time being. Besides, after 3 weeks cycling, it was now a struggle to walk up stairs, I should probably go on foot. After checking for bike shops on Google Maps, the first I tried was 2 km to the north, no luck, I couldn’t locate the shop, if the map was right, it was closed.

Then I spotted two close together 2 km to the south of the hotel, so back I went. The first one was closed, but the second, Saigon Bikes was open. Not only that, but the owner addressed me in English and I could see some bike boxes hiding behind a well-stocked cabinet of shimano bike parts. With a huge sense of relief, I tucked the folded up box under my arm and wandered back to the hotel.

I packed up the bike, outside the hotel, on the Wednesday morning, and was baffled by a lady who grabbed the box, chucked my empty water bottles in it and started to walk off with it. ‘Hey I need that!’

In the afternoon, I made a belated attempt at conventional tourism by heading to the ‘War Remnants Museum’ an utterly harrowing experience in which the Vietnamese have showcased the horrors to which they were subjected by the American military. The accounts of entire villages being completely ransacked were appalling, with the elderly, women, children and animals all slaughtered, buildings – such as they were – torched, and chemicals poured over the landscape to destroy crops and vegetation.

One thing that stood out above all else were the words of North Vietnamese President, Ho Chi Minh, whose name adorned the road I had been travelling for the past 3 weeks.

I was glad I went to the Museum, but also glad I went at the end of the trip. For a country which has undergone such trauma in the not too distant past, the scars seem to have healed remarkably well, and the country I travelled through is a testament to the unbreakable nature of the Vietnamese people. The welcome I received, up and down the country, was wonderful.

On my last evening in Vietnam, I decided to have a special meal to commemorate my successful adventure. Opting for the local delicacy of Australian Black Angus Fillet Steak, maybe there is a limit to the number of bowls of Pho I can endure in one month…

All was set, all I needed to do now was make it to the airport for my 13:55 flight to Hanoi. From there I would fly out to Doha at 18:20 and onwards to Edinburgh. ‘Sorry sir, your flight has been delayed to 6:20 PM’ were the unwelcome words from the Jetstar Pacific check-in desk. When I protested that I had another onward flight from Hanoi at exactly that time, I was told to go to their information desk, and from then on it was all systems go. I had to retrieve my bike from baggage control, before returning it to them again – as it was also outsized baggage. By that time, the staff had transferred me onto an earlier, Vietnam Airlines, flight, and running to the gate, I made final boarding.

Back in Hanoi there was a brief interlude between flights while I talked to a Frenchman, Auguste, as I waited for the interterminal bus. He was backpacking around the world and had been to Capo Verde, Martinique, Brazil, New Zealand, Australia and South Korea amongst other places and was heading on to New Delhi, India. He’d been travelling for 13 months already.

My second check-in process ground to a halt as the girl at the desk checked the Baggage Allowance information for British Airways, whom I’d booked my Qatar Airways flight through. The BA allowance was 23 kg, the bike box was 25 kg, if it was a BA flight I knew they’d let me through. As it was, I was sure I’d read that the baggage allowance for the flight should be the Qatar Airways allowance of 30 kg – as they were operating the flight. Having been moved out of the queue, I wasn’t flying anywhere until I found the link on the BA app that stated that for Qatar Airways flights, their conditions applied, my bike was under the limit.

On the flight to Doha I chatted to the passenger next to me, a London-based Luxembourger named Adrien, who was delighting in the freedom afforded to him by solo travel. During his 2 and a half week trip to Vietnam, he’d received an invite to celebrate the Lunar New Year with a friend in Taiwan, and had absolutely loved it, ending up there for a week. I considered how much freedom I’d had on my trip, as I slavishly ticked off places I’d preordained whilst still at home. But, pushing hard to achieve my targets early on had allowed me the opportunity to take things easier during the middle of the journey, enjoying spending time with some of the people I’d met along the away, and ultimately, it was the people that made a trip like this worth doing. The stunning landscapes and fascinating culture were just a bonus.

Day 21: Dong Xoai – Ho Chi Minh City

Day 21: Dong Xoai – Ho Chi Minh City

Distance: 66.21

Time: 5:39

Average Speed: 11.7 mph

The last leg, the final furlong, the end was nigh, all I needed to do was cycle 60 miles and I was done. Not that I was getting complacent, there could be a 5000 metre pass in my way for all I knew. But, after an early climb, the road took a turn for the better, and it was gradually descending for much of the day.

The road passed through a few endless towns, and with little in the way of scenery to keep me occupied, I found other distractions instead. I pondered why there seemed to be a cluster of speakers piping out bird song at the top of every tall building. I noted the fire remains outside every house – assuming them to be some form of New Year’s ritual – and I watched as several women sprinkled salt on the pavements outside their homes, clearly it’s not just Scotland that’s expecting snow.

I passed crashes too, on an otherwise empty section of Highway a car had smashed straight into the back of another, and further along the road, two scooters had had a collision, with one losing its front wheel in the process. Police were in attendance.

It was 34 degrees in the heat of the midday sun, and trying to push on into a 13 mile an hour headwind, I started to fade fast. Taking shelter in the next shop I passed, I downed two ice cold cans of juice and ate a large bag of crisps. Temperature back in check, I was still starving. After many days of running at a calorie deficit, my Bun Bo Hue noodles in the morning clearly hadn’t been enough. I rode on for long enough to find the next Com Ga stall. Approaching the counter the woman stated ‘Com Ga’, and that sounded ideal, a fried chicken wing with a huge pile of aromatic rice and a fresh ‘slaw.

Back on the highway, traffic was light, and most of the businesses along the route were still closed for Tet. The quiet roads made it frustrating at the stop lights as they counted down for 45 seconds or more, with nothing travelling the other way.

Eventually, I found myself on busier roads as the road crossed a huge roundabout under a bridge, then crossed the Sai Gon river into District 1.

After winding my way through the city streets, passed rows of towering hotels, I located my own – the Silverland Yen – arriving just in time for afternoon tea. Later, I took in the views from the rooftop terrace, a moment to reflect on a wonderful trip.

I call this one ‘Orange Juice with Saigon Skyline’.

It had taken me 21 days to cycle from Hanoi to Ho Chi Minh City, a total distance of 1,196 miles, and an average of 56.96 miles a day.

Vietnam 2020: The Ho Chi Minh Trail

Gearing Up

Since I returned from cycling the Pacific Coast Highway in June 2017, I have been asked countless times if I had any more cycling trips planned. The answer was usually, ‘no, not yet, but I’ve had a few ideas!’ It was always going to take some time before I was ready to undergo a similar trip again. For a start, successfully completing my biggest challenge yet meant that my ambitions were likely to remain higher for future endeavours, and that required me to find a long enough window with which to fit my plans.

Another problem was that, since the America trip, my touring bike had had a fairly tough time of it. In January 2018, I was out for a short cycle not far from home when I changed gear to pedal up a steep hill and there was a loud crunch from the back of the bike. The chain had broken, the rear derailleur had snapped in half and bent the derailleur mounting point on the frame in the process. Not good. In the end, it turned out an absolutely trashed small chainring, from my 2000 mile sojourn, was the root of the problem, and it was really spring 2019 before it was back up and running properly.

Then it was time to start planning something…

Opting to go in January helped narrow the range of possibilities significantly, and in the end I was trying to decide between an End to End of New Zealand or something in South-East Asia. I decided to leave New Zealand until I was feeling less adventurous, so South-East Asia it was. I’d been to Thailand, so not there. A lack of tarmacked roads and a predominance of hills did for Cambodia and Laos respectively, and eventually, it was the lure of a 1000 mile stretch of well-maintained tarmac through rural farmland and stunning karst mountains that won it. So, as of the 4th of January, I’m heading for the Ho Chi Minh Highway – between Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City – in Vietnam!

Hope you can join me,

Michael

To read about my Pacific Coast trip start here:

https://pedaltheglobeblog.wordpress.com/2017/04/30/my-pacific-coast-odyssey/

To read about my Morocco trip:

https://pedaltheglobeblog.wordpress.com/2017/02/22/413-miles-and-endless-hills/