Blazing Saddles

Mark

 We are woken for an early start with a loud speaker playing patriotic music and making public announcements. Following this as we try to doze as the noise of pigs in distress gradually starts to build up. It appears that our hotel rooms are located just above the pig selling area of the local market. Pigs arrive in bags on poles and some dragged along on a piece of string - welcome to the day.

After the now traditional morning coffee it is down to the market to evaluate the various items on display and see what useful things we might get to bring back to NZ.  A new breakfast today rice dumpling with egg and pork, with a chive soup for dipping this in. This is had sitting on the 'traditional' Vietnamese plastic stool - very similar to a pre-school size.
Then it is a 20 km ride back into the mountains to the Black Flag Staff - this is the furthermost point north in Vietnam and from here you are on the China - Vietnam border. This is apparently a very popular place for the Vietnamese to come and visit.

We then head to our next stopping point Bao Lac City - driving through some absolutely incredible landscapes. Having described the previous day as fantastic and one before as awesome I am not sure what the next level is. The rocky nature of the country had some of the rock type appearance as central Otago but here the scale was significantly  more dramatic and intense, as you rode through some of the passes the landscape just hit you.
As we drive up and down these incredible hills at any time you can come across hill people walking along the road side, sometimes with huge loads of items on their backs. The distance that they must travel would often be considerable coming down to the town for market and returning back following this.

Len

Some common phrases of geriatric bikers:

• Has anyone seen my reading glasses?
• @#$%! that was close!
• What was the name of that last town again? again?
• Anyone feel like a beer?
• A pit stop soon would be good
• I'm having a bit of trouble getting my leg over
• What is that smell?
• 1 down 4 up, 1 down 4 up
• No, you can't put that in the blog.

Comment of the day:

• I didn't realise that it was possible to snore and burp at the same time until I shared a room with you

Interesting discussions so far:

• The price of milk
• The impact of corn on the development of society
• MYOB vs Xero
• Raising children and the nature-nurture debate
• Selling state assets
• Mother of the bride dresses (this has been solved and all will be revealed)
• Motorcycles of our youth

Ross
With Mark having described the day and Len having done the philosophising it falls to me to add something erudite.  But after a long day getting very saddle sore and a couple of beers - it's  not going to happen.  The title of this blog is not so much about the burning saddles as the heat associated with parts in contact with it.

My bike has been running poorly for the last couple of days and Chuong replaced the coil today.  It has made a great difference to both the bike and my riding.  There are spells where the mountain roads flow and the line on every corner is perfect and safe.  Then there are times when it doesn't.  Much of this is just relaxing, looking ahead,  looking wide and not braking in the corners.  The relaxing bit gets upset quite easily: a downpour, steep drop offs or just lack of zen.

Lunch was rather strange.  We tend to eat in small local places - usually there are no big international places anyway, but we are trying to eat a completely local diet.  Today Chuong had chosen a place that looked like a normal lunch stop.  As usual the bathroom was out the back and I wandered off to wash the road dust and sweat off.  It was a bit surprising to go past several bedrooms on the way, but many families combine business and home, so I thought no more about it.   The proprietor's daughters were watching television at the back of the restaurant - and were dressed in a style that was more Hanoi brief than local Hmong modest, but no different from bored teenagers everywhere.
Back at the table, Choung explains that the proprietor has 7 or 8 girls working at the restaurant for the tourist trade (Lunch with benefits). I am about to say there seem far too many waitresses doing bugger all when he provides a much more explicit explanation.   Lunch is fairly subdued after that - although the fish was very good.  I don't think Chuong will be choosing the same style of restaurant for the rest of the trip.
Continuing on the same theme:  There is a variety of ground plant (I think it's related to acacia) who's leaves close up instantly when touched.  Chuong explains that it is virgin grass - shy when touched.