Epic excursion to the village

This Sunday we embarked on an epic excursion to Phuong's village! Phuong's a friend from work, and her family lives about 50 kilometers south of Hue, in a quaint village near the beach.

Thanks to my housemate Ute, we got quite a crowd, bringing along Marie, Doro and Peter!

Off at 7:30 am, we had a few hiccups along the way, when Marie's chain fell off her bike repeatedly. But each time, within 30 seconds, there was someone there to help us! Literally all we had to do was stop and a man with a wrench and some tools just appeared! The first few fixes involved packing tape and lasted just long enough for us to loose sight of the guy who fixed it, but finally we got a good fix!



After a few refuels and some nuoc mia (sugar can juice), we arrived at the village at lunch time. We pedaled to the beach, which was perfect, and enjoyed fresh seafood lunch! A giant grilled fish (which nearly jumped onto the grill from the bucket where it was happily swimming before), some shrimp, and also clams and veggies! Good thing we exercised...



After such a feast we got a late start back. And then took an alternate route on a smaller street through the country side, where we were greeted with "HELLO HELLO HELLO" at ever corner, and dodged herds of water buffalo. I wouldn't have done it any other way, even though it was 7:30 by the time we got home, and we somehow ended up on an unpaved road full of potholes to navigate by dark... troi dat oi!



We all made it in one piece and thoroughly enjoyed a celebratory bowl of noodles at Pho Saigon!

Cross training and fundraising

This weekend I spent at my friends house in Da Nang...so no bike but a beautiful beach where I could do some exercise in the morning!!
And then some shell art afterwords.

This weekend is the SPIRAL Foundation spring sale in the Pacific Palisades, LA, CA. A fundraiser for the disabled artists I work with here in Hue. And my generous boss has agreed to put a box to collect for AIDS LifeCycle for me! THANKS!

Check out the fundraiser
http://www.spiralfoundation.org/events.aspx?page=events/#springsale

Foiled

Foiled by the rain this weekend...a gallant effort was made to bike to the beach. But when the bike tire broke and we sat in the rain as it got fixed, decided today was instead a day for a cross training run followed by the hot springs .... ;)

Take me down to the Tomb City

This weekend to Tomb City!!

The longest ride so far - took over six hours. Took all day and I learned that my bike seat is not my friend.
Well worth the ride though - tomb city is literally a city of tombs, stretching further than you can see, full of beautifully ornate tombs (buddhist and christian, interestingly, yet all built in traditional buddhist/chinese style, some just have a crucifix on top!). It has the feeling of a holy place, not the spooky feeling of a graveyard. Each tomb is trying to outdo its neighbor, which makes for some remarkably outstanding tombs!

And then there were swan boats

Off for a ride last weekend, headed generally East with not much more of a plan than that. There was a temple I thought I might have seen from the top of a hill last week...well the temple was never found but I did find another beautiful temple with a giant bell on top of a hill that overlooked the city.


After the temple we stopped for some very local lunch and practiced our Vietnamese, finally getting some soy sauce (after getting fish sauce with lime, and fermented soybean paste...miscommunication).

And somehow we found ourselves at a giant gate, and I didn't recognize any of the words on the sign. In front of us was a van filled with children...and there was an entrance fee...we asked the lady at the window and she said "FISH!" and then drew fish with a circle around them. A lake! So we paid our fee...and then found ourselves doing some cross training - padding swan boats around the lake (and checking out the liliput fairy land on the other side!)





Oh Vietnam, always got something up its sleeve...

To the beach

This weekend was sun sun sun again, so a bike ride to the beach!
I rode my bike solo on the way there, but met up with my friend once I got there...and bicycling back next to a motorbike the whole way back was motivation to keep up my speed

I like to ride my bicycle I like to ride my bike....

So it's about time I got my booty in shape for the AIDS LifeCycle fast approaching in June....
So I found this awesome group called Cycling for the Environment. They meet every Sunday, take a bike ride and go clean up trash! This weekend we cleaned a canal, and also did a survey of the people in the neighborhood to learn about their options for trash collection and their knowledge of Environmental programs in Hue.
Morning well spent!