Ho Chi Min City & Nha Trang, Vietnam

or HCMC or Saigon (pick your fave) was a blast. We got dropped off on the side of the road at night (what else is new?) and were quickly rushed off by a polite bus tout to a guesthouse a few blocks and alleys away. We felt entirely lost walking through tiny alleys until all of a sudden we appeared in front of a guesthouse, nice and clean with breakfast for $16. We decided to celebrate our first night in Vietnam with some yummy Tiger beer. We easily made some crazy (read : weird Americans) friends and spent the night and too much of the morning partying. Got a late start the next day, jumped into a cab and wound up at the American War Museum. Please note that we hopped in a cab and not on the back of a moto this time because M feared for her life. There's about, oh I don't know, a trillion motos in Saigon, all weaving and honking their way through traffic. It is utter chaos, but somehow it all seems to work. Though the tourists walking around with bandages scared us a bit. Anyway, the war museum was nothing special much to our surprise. LP says you can't miss it, but we beg to differ (though we must note that it's under construction).
We hopped in another cab, headed to the market, shmoozed around for awhile, then ate some delicious street food. Vietnamese food is a bit different than we would've expected, the vegetarian options are few and all with an American-style Chinese food twist. But this food (read: noodles and spring rolls) outdid most dishes and was washed down with a dragon fruit shake for M and an avaocado shake for P. Delicious. We hurried back to grab our bags and board our first of many Vietnamese overnight buses. And what a trip this bus turned out to be. Think Japanese capsule hotel on wheels and you've hit the nail on the head. We wound up with some of the worst seats on the bus and were squished like sardines with 3 other strangers. Combined with the worst bus driver in history, we had a sleepless night and were exhausted upon our arrival in Nha Trang. Thankfully, snoozing on the beach restored us to our former selves. We failed miserably trying to transfer buses to bring us to Hoi An and spent the day relaxing on the beach. Not such a terrible way to spend the day. Apparently, there are no local buses in Vietnam and everyone rides these "open tour" buses which only leave twice a day. We could have spent 10 hours crammed into a minibus with cigarette smoking local men, but cheerfully opted for the beach. While M relaxed on her beach chair due to a heightened hatred of sand and salt, P jumped waves like she couldn't believe. A few showers later and it was time for overnight bus #2. A word of advice: If you are trying to cover great distances in Vietnam, 2 overnight buses does the trick. You won't sleep a wink on the first and will be so damn exhausted, you won't stay awake for a second on the next. But make sure you get the bottom bunks, it makes all the difference.