2. Strawberry Fields Forever.
3. The Gorgeous Random Hill. Your excellent driver, Lulu, pulls up at a sun-glistening swath of green and points up a mountain. “You climb now. Some exercise. Nice view.” “Um, what?” you stutter, thinking of landmines and ticks and
Very soon you see why this was necessary. Puffing that crisp mountain air, you arrive at the crest and take in wave after wave of blue, green, misty purple, and rich gold! What a view! The sun and the exertion feel incredible, the pine trees smell sparkly, and it’s nearly an hour of scampering around before you return to your grinning driver. Wise man.
5. Vistas, a Lake, and a Coffee Farm!!!! Up and down serpentine mountain roads you wind, feeling a sense of love between you
Coffeeeee!! As a veteran of the arise-at-5am-every-morning Boston Public Schools clan,
“Ninety percent of Vietnamese drink coffee,” says Lulu. “It is very important. You know what we call people who don’t drink coffee?”
6. Elephant Waterfall. According to Lulu, there used to be wild elephants around here, but they were all murdered by poachers. Now there is just a statue and the title to remember the majestic animals by.
The waterfall is giant and gushing, but turns into an utterly disgusting endeavor as Lulu leads you UNDER the waterfall, via a crack into a particularly muddy cave.
Inside the temple are figures with dozens of arms. “Can we take pictures in a pagoda?” you whisper to a British tourist. “Um, I’ve taken loads and they haven’t killed me yet, so go right ahead,” he replies.
Outside, rays of sun sparkle down on the low green mountains and a storm cloud puffs purple far off.
9. The Crazy House! Like, really crazy. Um, wow. So there was this Vietnamese architect woman who decided to create the weirdest guest house on earth: a mix of a dripping cave, an LSD trip, a sculpture museum, and (hellooo really high, banister-free staircase bridges!) a lawsuit waiting to happen. Trudge up, down, and around with an utterly bewildered look on your face and squeeze by other tourists doing the same.
Can you imagine actually sleeping in this guest house?! Worst idea ever. No wait– the worst idea ever was walking across that spindly stair bridge which turns out to lead to… an empty space thirty feet in the air! How clever! The Crazy House is still under construction
You’ve been on the road from 9am to 4pm, and now you shake Lulu’s hand, pay him the $10, and nestle into a free Wi-Fi cafe to write this article so others can re-take this strange tour with you. Hope you didn’t get too sunburned!
Catch more of Lillie’s adventures at Around the World “L”!