We left Phan Thiet for a leasurely 150km drive to Dalat, unfortunately the toll road was washed out so we had to take the rural route, meaning the trip took 5 hours, doing an average speed of 40 – 50 kms an hour max.
As we drove through the mountains, we had some great views down onto lakes and fishing villages, we stopped at a coffee shop, where we were the only customers, and had an interesting coffee while taking in the view.
We also stopped at a campground where people could swim and camp.
The rope bridge was scary and the camp area had many sculptures and animal statues, quite interesting.
This snake scupture was very impressive.
We stayed at Ana Mandara Villas Dalat Resort & Spa, which was a French inspired resort set above Dalat. Each villa had 5 or 6 rooms in it and to get around the resort you rang for a golf cart to come and pick you up, they were very efficient. We enjoyed sitting outside having afternoon tea and looking down over the city.
Bruce asked them to put us near Deb and Neil, but they somehow interrpretted this as us wanting a cot. When they saw how old we were, they realised the error.
Our first game of golf was at Dalat 1200 – which is situated 1200m above sea level. It was a pretty rocky trip to get into the course and then you had to look down onto the fairways from up quite high. We really liked the condition of the course, but there were too many creek crossing that made you layup, this meant that you were then having to play long approach shots, which isn’t easy for most of us. Bruce shot 28/98 and Rosie shot 25/101, which wasn’t good.
The Hmong people were herding their water buffalo on Dalat 1200, which added an interesting hazard.
That evening we went to the Dalat street markets, after going to a shoe shop to get some Air Jordans. This was very interesting in its set up, very wide streets with a lot of room to walk around. We had to go down a large staircase to get to the market and there were hundreds of people sitting on small stools eating street food that they had bought.
After walking around the markets we went into a traditional restaurant and Bruce ordered Bánh xèo which was a savoury, crispy Vietnamese crepes made from rice flour, coconut milk, and turmeric. It has pork, beef and seafood on it like a pizza. We also were given a plate of what looked like plastic sheets and a plate of herbs and lettuce. We all looked at it and wondered what to do until the manager came over and showed us how to prepare it.
The plastic wrap was actually a type of rice paper that held its shape while you made your wrap and then dissolved as you dipped it into the sauces provided. We all love it.
The next day, we organised our own day trip to see the suggested sites of Dalat. The Crazy House, underwhelming house that you might see at an amusement park with lots of stairs and weird rooms. Then the old Railway, a rip off where you paid to go into an old disused railway station that didn’t have many redeeming features, and lots of shop inside. The the Dalat Cable car, which was slightly more interesting, but didn’t really go over any nice landscapes.
The final part of our journey was to go into the mountains and visit a coffee plantation. This was a really nice drive and the lunch was very enjoyable. The coffee tour was a bit too educational for us, we would have preferred less talk and more making coffee.
The views of Elephant Falls, from the coffee plantation, were quite spectacular, as was the view of the huge Buddha.
As you can see, Bruce focussed intently making his traditional Vietnamese coffee, but failed, along with everyone else, except Rosie. She made the perfect coffee, but doesn’t drink it.
Our second game of golf was at the Dalat Palace Golf and Country club, this was an older course, but was in excellent very condition. They were refurbishing some of the fairways with new couch to maintain condition the condition of the course.
Bruce took a couple of Celebrex before the game, since his foot was coping with having to walk from the cart paths down to the fairways and back again. This time we all played the course much better since there were no unusual hazards. Bruce shot 38/86 and Rosie shot 25/101. Rosie is having trouble consistently hitting off the fairways and is starting to experiment to improve her game. We hope she starts to have more success soon.
