"We keep on"

It wasn't my first choice of activities for the next four days but after plenty of goading, I was finally convinced. I'd been traveling with two Irishmen named Pat and Paul for the last couple weeks and their visas were running out soon. Paul, in particular, needed to be out of the country within a week and we were still a ways from Saigon. The opportunity came up to spend the next four days riding motorbikes from Dalat to Saigon and this kind of adventure seemed to be the perfect way to spend their last days in Vietnam.

Huddled around a table in Dalat, Pat, Paul and I discussed the terms of the trip with Mr. Phuc. Mr. Phuc was part of a group named the Easy Riders... a rag tag group of motorbike guides who organized around 15 years ago under a common banner. They came highly recommended from pretty much everyone and though their prices were steep, their standard of service reflected this, allegedly. Sitting around that table discussing things, we had no idea that we were going to see first hand what differentiates the Easy Riders from everyone else.

Terms agreed on, contracts signed and bikes delivered, we left Dalat at 8:30AM on day 1. Mr Phuc in front then Pat, Paul and myself heading up the rear, we tore our way through the hills outside of that scenic mountain town taking in some incredible views and sights along the way. The trip started out great and before lunch it was clear that the next few days had a lot in store.

Lunch was spent eating “Vietnam food at Vietnam prices” as Mr. Phuc liked to say and he continued to tell us that the next section of road would test our riding skills. It seemed like hyperbole and just another way of saying that it was steep and curvy (more so than before anyways) but we kept that in mind. We left the roadside eatery in the same order as earlier and after heading down the road a bit, I saw Pat and his bike cut clear across his lane to the outside of the curve we were on.

I had a perfect view of the whole thing from the back. Cornering through a tight left turn, Pat suddenly shot to the outside and straight into a concrete pillar. There weren't guardrails out there but there were evenly spaced waist high pillars made of concrete on the tighter corners. After colliding with one of these, both bike and rider did a front flip (they separated in mid-air) and landed down the steep embankment. Paul and I stopped suddenly and I motioned for him to head down the road and catch up wth Mr. Phuc (I never really learned his first name). I pulled up and assessed the damage.

There were pieces of the bike's fairing strewn about the road and Pat was lying face up in a bush with his bike about 10 feet away. Rushing over to pull him out, I asked if he was ok and to my surprise he said that he was. Still skeptical, I reached out to give him a hand but he stood up just fine and walked up the hill to the road. Shaking the dirt off, he assessed the damage and concluded that, much to our collective amazement, there was none. The bike on the other hand did not make out so well.

It took all 4 of us to pull that bike out and when we finally got it upright, it was clear that it took the brunt of the damage. The fairing was in pieces, the handlebars bent, break pedal bent and front break lines hung free. It wouldn't start and it obviously needed some work. Mr. Phuc coasted the bike to a mechanic followed by me to bring him back on my bike. The mechanic couldn't get the bike running and the two of us road back to the rest of the group to assess our options.

When we got there, I got a better explanation of what happened. Pat had looped the shoulder straps of his day pack over the handlebars. Turning sharply to the left, sent the pack to the outside and weighted down the handlebars causing him to careen to the right. Regardless, we were faced with one less bike and a decision to make. Pat decided not to scrap the trip and that he would ride on the back of Mr. Phuc's bike for the rest of it. We were going to make it to Saigon by two wheels as long as we were all still in one piece.

What a day so far it had been and it was just the beginning of this adventure. After redistributing all the gear, it appeared that we were ready to get moving again after sitting at that roadside for a couple hours.


Mr. Phuc turned to the 3 of us and, like he concluded every stop along the whole trip, said “we keep on.”
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I've uploaded plenty of pictures from the whole trip on my Flickr account and if anyone is interested, I'll make another post about the rest of it. I'm writing this from Mui Ne and I fly out of Vietnam in just 3 days. Oh and after all that, the total cost for the repair that Pat had to pay was $50.