Vietnam trip - Day 12 (12/12/11)

I got up and 6am this morning, that's what I get for sleeping around 8:30pm :). I guess after the nightmare-ish train ride with little sleep, a well deserved 10 hrs sleep was in ordered :).
Around 8am, we took a taxi to a pho place. The weather is still cloudy but no rain and minimal wind so that's good. Anyway, we got to the pho place and it was only me eating and I must say the broth is comparable to pho 75 however I can't say much about the meat though. I almost ordered a second bowl :). After I finished, we took a cab to another temple which is famous for it's 5 caves. As the cab pulled into the little road, there were shops on my left and right selling different buddhist stone carved figurines. There were variety of sizes, big one, medium one and small one (see pix). All the souvenirs like necklaces, bracelets and fingurines are made from stone. Most of the figurines are made here in this little town (limestone? Dont know what type of stone they are). The cab stopped at the gate, we got out and i looked up and it was like stair way to heaven. It was a steep climb and was a little bit challenge for my dad and uncle to climb the stairs. As we were walking, i looked down and noticed something look familiar. I looked closer and noticed it was my name "chroang", j/k but it would of be cool if it was. I saw "Hoang" written on one of the step (see pix). We finally made it and the first thing we saw was the temple. It was a little bit smaller than the one we went yesterday. We went inside, did a little prayer and continue on to the caves. We went to 2 of the 5 caves because the old folks couldn't climb the other three which were fine. The two caves that we went in have Buddha and other Buddhist statues in them. I would figure the same goes for the other three caves. We tour the place around an hr or so and came out the other side of the mountain. As we were walking out the gate, to my right I saw something the looked like an elevator. Indeed it was an elevator, a long one too. The old folks could of used it to get to the temple instead of climbing :).
We left and went to a veggie place where this time all three of us ate, I had some type of veggie noodle soup and wasn't bad. After an early lunch ( around 10:30am), we had back to our hotel. I just finished my luke warm evenly cool shower.
It's 2pm and we just checked out of our rooms and on our way to lunch. We stopped by some restaurant and I had some rice with fish and tofu. It was a filler :). After a late lunch we stopped by a relative's place until 7pm then we'll go to the train station.
It's 5:40pm and we just finished dinner. I had bun bo hue and veggie pouridge...I know piggy, that I am :).
Anyway, the bun bo hue was good. It's the first time I had with vermicelli noodle. The veggie pouridge was delicious and light (see pix). And to top that off, I had a fresh, hot delicious glass of soy milk.
It's I'm just sitting here and listen they talk. This sweet old lady used to watch my uncle, my mom and Huy and Hieu's mom. She said how my mom was spoiled and kind of a wild child...haha, that's funny.
It's 8pm and we are at the train station. Right out side the station is a main street with a lot going on and right smack in the middle is a lounge and it's playing techno music...oh yeah!!! I'm shuffling as my blogging ;). One more hr won't be too long with the music cranking :).
Wth, I went to pee at the train station as I walked out some lady point at the try and said "money" in Vietnamese. I was like "money?" to myself. Finally I figured it out she wanted tips. I didn't have any dong (vietnamese money) I was about to give a dollar and a nice older gentleman also went said a dollar is too much so he hooked me up with 1000 dong (like 5 cents US), that was very nice of him. I thought giving tip was an option. I guess you have to pay money to go to the bathroom...live and learn :).
My uncle just told me the train will arrive at 10pm and not 9:15pm, great! I must say there are a lot of foreigners that come to Da Nang because the station is full of white folks :). Wth, I just saw a young monk put a white iPhone 4 after talking. I guess they used the donation money and hooked themselves up with iPhones and probably iPads :), must be nice :). So it's 10:16pm and we are on the train. This time we have beds, there are 6 bunk beds in a 6x6 ft space...$20 us dollar get you a bed. I guess this better than sitting on a wooded bench. One of the bed has 3 older ladies. I rather fly! Ok, I'll see you guys tomorrow morning.
To be continue...


P.s:
-check out the dude with the white socks, that's hot!
-daytime plumber, night time taxi driver (you'll will know which pix I'm talking about)