Stage 6: Ha Tinh to Ky Nam (76km)

Stage 6: Ha Tinh to Ky Nam (76km)

Following a local lunch we took our bikes for a quick hose down at a local place which washed scooters, to get rid of the grit and mud of the previous day's wet ride.  We were waved off by the friendly hotel owner and the shop girl next door, who had both wished us strength and luck to complete our journey to Saigon.

We left Ha Tinh around 1330 in warm sunshine, our waterproofs safely packed away.  On the way out we stopped to buy some 'cu do', a local sweet speciality of rice cracker wafer and peanut brittle.  Energy food which we thought might come in handy.

About 12km down the road near Cam Xuyen we rode past our first major road accident.  The others had merely been smashed watermelons dropped in transit.  This was a calf that had wandered into the road and lost a contest with some large vehicle judging by the bloodstains in the road.  A group of locals had dragged the carcass to the side of the road, leaving blood smeared all the way across it.  As we rode past we could see that it had almost been rent in half.  A bovine hit-and-run, the vehicle which killed it hadn't stopped.

We debated riding back to take pictures of the scene and decided not to as locals swarmed all around by the roadside, another accident waiting to happen as traffic continued to blare past.  We pondered how much the loss would dent the fortunes of the local farmer and noted that most cattle was tethered securely by the roadside to graze.

As we continued past green paddy field scenery with mountains looming in the distance, the odd labourer greeted the sight of us and our bikes with friendly waves.

We reached Ky Anh, 53km away at 1600 and stopped for a break to refuel at a roadside place selling noodle soup and cold drinks.  The decision was made to press on as far as we could until darkness fell.

We rode on through Ky Thinh and then the roadside dwellings became replaced by interspersed construction sites of factory buildings and barren new settlements.  Approaching Ky Nam, as the sky darkened, we saw the Hotel Hoa Sim (Descon Kyoto) advertised by the road and came off Highway 1 to investigate.  It turned out to be a spread out resort with terraced bungalow rooms by a clean sandy white beach.

We checked in as darkness fell and my brother managed a quick dip in the sea before dinner at the beachside restaurant.

There seemed to be a lot of staff about the resort with an apparent lack of guests.  At dinner we spoke
to many of them as they sat about with not much to do.  All were locals from nearby Ky Nam and they
were curious about our trip and where we'd ridden in from.  There was a distinct family feel to the place and it seemed the staff were entrusted to look after the owner's child (a 2 year old girl) whilst they were in Hanoi on business.  They all laughed when we told them how hard their Ha Tinh accents were to understand as we ordered dinner.

We were surprised to find kimchi on the menu and ordered some to go with our meal.  One of the waitresses explained that a lot of personnel from overseas construction companies at local sites stayed at the resort.  As groups of them came in for dinner it seemed that there was a mixture of Korean, Japanese and Chinese workers.  We were amazed at how one of the main waitresses was so adept at each of these foreign languages when dealing with these guests.  She told us later that she was better at some of the languages than others and only knew enough for business.  We told her that it was still impressive how she'd effectively learned these languages on the job.

The next morning we woke to brilliant sunshine with a beach to relax on and the easy decision was made to stay for a few days.