On January 10th we took a turboprop airplane an hour north of Saigon, to Nha Trang. The Nha Trang airport is merely an open-air building without any terminals or gates. We had booked a room with a hotel recommended by Hotel 127 in Saigon. Our hotel driver was waiting with a sign that read "Susanne"; he looked strikingly similar to Mr. Miyagi from The Karate Kid.

The driver introduced himself, and said that he used to be a pilot in the Vietnamese Air Force. We could tell already that he was an interesting old man. He grabbed our luggage and led us to the parking lot where his green military jeep was waiting. It was in remarkably good condition, with a soft top and the sides opened up. We drove through central Nha Trang along the main beach, passing all the large hotels, and then passed through a poor neighborhood where the road was all torn up. A brand new bridge had just been built over the Cai River, but the road on either side was not yet paved.

We arrived at La Paloma and checked in while fresh fruit, baguettes and omelets were brought out to us. A woman and her son were already eating their breakfast, and she immediately struck up a conversation with us. We learned that she is originally from the Philippines but moved to Saudi Arabia for work twelve years ago, where she met her husband. Her son, Michael (pronounced Mee-KEL), is about eight-years-old. After a few short years in Saudi Arabia they moved to Sweden and later divorced, sharing custody of their son. She spoke to her son in Swedish, but spoke to us in perfect English.

After breakfast Mike and I went for a nap as we were exhausted from getting up at 4:30 AM that morning. That night we enjoyed a delicious homemade dinner at the hotel, followed by hours of fun conversation with the hotel staff. There was a man who ran the business part of the hotel, and his wife was the chef. There was also Nu, a tiny young woman who managed the staff. Then there were two younger women who went to school and worked part time; they loved chatting with us to practice their English skills.

The following day we took a tour of the area with the Swedish mother and son in the jeep, with Mr. Miyagi driving. First we drove to the nearby Po Nagar Cham towers, built on a hill between the 7th and 12th centuries. Four of the original ten towers remain intact. Our Swedish friend warned us that the beggars had pestered her when she visited the day before. Sure enough, as soon as we started climbing the stairs to the towers we were surrounded by children selling postcards. Our next stop was the White Buddha, built atop a hill on the western edge of Nha Trang. As usual, the postcard sellers latched onto us and provided unwanted commentary on the sights; they cornered us behind the cremation tombs and guilted us into buying their postcards. We relented, buying one packet of postcards so they would just leave us alone. Right next door is the Long Son Pagoda, where we were again hit up for money. There was a very ornate statue of a deity (Buddha or Vishnu?) with 42 arms, and a pretty old reclining Buddha behind the pagoda.

Next we drove out to the picturesque countryside through the emerald green rice paddies. We continued down a pot-holed dirt road with lots of big rocks thrown in for an extra-bumpy ride in the jeep. We eventually came to a dead-end, the park headquarters for a 3-stage waterfall. The four of us trekked up the waterfall, little Michael leading the way as any fearless 8-year-old would do. The hiking trail soon became a series of large boulders and steep slopes. We made it to stages 1 and 2, but couldn’t figure out how to proceed to stage 3 without killing ourselves in the process.

We lingered at stage 2 for a while, people-watching. There was a wealthy Russian family with a knock-out teenage daughter, tall and waif-thin. She posed suggestively in her white string bikini while her older boyfriend snapped photos of her. Her boyfriend looked exactly like my brother-in-law’s (Nick’s) brother, Bill. We tried to snap some photos of the Bill look-alike without getting caught. There was also an older, retired couple at stage 2; the wife was reading while her husband used various picks and tools to investigate the wildlife. We thought perhaps he was a geologist or bug collector; either way, he was breaking the park’s rules by damaging and collecting the wildlife. There were only a handful of local Vietnamese people selling cold beverages along the trail, but thankfully they didn’t bother us.

The final part of our jeep tour was lunch at a deserted beach resort, about 40 minutes north of Nha Trang. It was a huge resort (Doc Let Resort, I think) with a long powdery beach, although it was very windy and the waves were pretty daunting. There were also some tennis courts, accommodations, and a couple of huge restaurants. We were the only ones there, aside from some kids selling postcards. We all climbed back in the jeep for the breezy drive home.