22nd January - Chips with everything

We get up early and bag a poolside table for breakfast. The sun is actually shining this morning although humidity is still high. At 10.00 we depart for Ga Da Nang where we bid farewell to our guide Do and meet the new one, Dien. He gets off to a dodgy start by issuing train tickets and then calling them all back in and reissuing. When the train arrives, almost on time, some of our group are very confused which leads to people being on the wrong coach and in the wrong compartment. Very much like the Indian train boarding experience. Naturally we are in the right place and can view proceedings with detached amusement.

The coach is 4 berth cabins but rather older than the first one and distinctly grubbier. The sheets on the berths look like they have been turned out by Indian Railways North Western Zone who have won R's dirtiest clean bed linen award on a number of occasions. Fortunately we are only on as day passengers for the ten hour trip to Nha Trang and can dispense with the offending items. We have the luxury of being two people to a cabin which is fortunate as there would be no chance of  fitting four of us with our luggage. This train appears to have a mixture of modern and old coaches. One of the AC Sleepers is a new one as are the Chair Cars but beyond that is an old coach with wooden seats.

The Editor is a bit under the weather today and dosing himself with cold and flu tablets. This, coupled with a general lack of exciting scenery or any notable events makes for a rather dull episode of the blog today. The biggest excitement is opening our packed lunch bags to discover a cellophane wrapped packet of cold chips to be one of the contents. R is quite pleased with the bird watching from the train, spotting Intermediate Egrets, Greater Coucals, a brown shrike, drongos and a heron of some sort. Mostly the Kindles take a hammering. R is tempted by one of the vendors into buying what she thinks is peanut brittle. It turns out to be extremely chewy sweet jelly of indeterminate flavour, containing a few peanuts and coated in sesame seeds. The so

At Nha Trang we disembark and board a bus for the short ride to our hotel. We are allocated a room on the 19th floor which is very spacious and fitted with a window between the room and bathroom. We have seen this in various places in Asia, although usually the glass is obscured. R wastes no time in lowering the blind. We have not eaten for around nine hours and order sandwiches and beer from Room Service. These come with chips. It seems rude not to eat them.