Teacher Trekker

When traveling north from Ho Chi Minh City (HCMC), people have a number of options when deciding where to venture next. Many people choose to take a faster route, skipping a few smaller cities along the way to end up in the coastal beach city of Nha Trang that is roughly 12 hours away by both bus and train. Flying is always a more expensive option, but it is obviously much faster. Since it was early in my trip, I decided to explore a few smaller cities on my way to Nha Trang, specifically the beach town of Mui Ne and Dalat in the Central Highlands, which I will review in future articles.

Packed & Ready to Go (That green thing on the left is a tripod chair!)

After exploring HCMC for a number of days, it was time to head north for greener pastures. First I needed to negotiate and secure transportation. This can be done at any and all of the nearly countless travel agencies around Pham Ngu Lao Street and the surrounding District 1 Backpacker Area. Most agencies stay open until approximately 10 p.m., but many of the tours and transportation tickets may be full or sold out. Fortunately, I managed to get the last seat on one of the sleeper buses to Mui Ne the following morning at 8 a.m., but the group of backpackers that tried to purchase tickets before me was told that if they wanted to travel together, they needed to take the later bus. There was ample room on the afternoon bus that departed around 12:30 p.m., but I saw leaving at that time as a waste of a day and wanted to get to Mui Ne as soon as possible. Lucky me or so I thought at the time! In terms of securing transportation I have a few recommendations: book your transportation as soon as you have formulated your travel plans. Furthermore, the larger the group, the more difficult it will be to secure the earliest transport out so plan accordingly. Finally, don’t sit in seat 2B on the sleeper bus unless you truly need to get wherever it is you are going as quickly as possible!

Sleeper Bus to Mui Ne

Travelers were told to arrive at Pham Ngu Lao Street next to Park 23/9 to wait for the bus to pick them up for transport. Most of the agencies work cooperatively to fill the buses. The agent I bought my ticket from one night earlier for $12 was already at the travel agency stand, so she was able to point me in the right direction, but it was as simple as finding the corresponding bus number with the number indicated on your receipt. Shortly after 8 a.m. the bus arrived and passengers flooded the bus to prepare for the relatively short trip. The bus was mixed with locals and tourists. The bus would be making a few stops along the way to pick up more passengers as well as a number of stops as the bus approached Mui Ne.

From HCMC it is approximately a four hour bus ride to Mui Ne. This would not have been a problem if it wasn’t for the fact that I had the only seat on the entire bus that didn’t have air conditioning. Seat 2B is devoid of air conditioning. At first this was just an inconvenience as everyone else on the bus was blasting the cold air of the air conditioning from their vents. As the ride continued people eventually started closing their vents and the overall temperature of the bus went up. As a result, a once cold bus turned into a warm bus with only a few people using the air conditioning. By the time we arrived in town, most passengers were in the fetal position shivering, some with nothing and at most others with a tiny blanket to keep them warm. I on the other hand was sweating so much against the pleather seat, that I was basically dying for cool air. It’s scary to say this, but it was cooler when I walked off the bus into the heat and humidity of Vietnam than the temperature I endured on the bus.

After I experienced this problem I went looking for this engineering flaw on the other sleeper buses I rode while in Vietnam. Just as I thought, the 2B seat on the other buses did not have an air conditioning vent either. Now it all makes sense! This was the only seat left on the bus, and if locals were aware of this problem, I would assume that they would not want to sit in this seat. The seat was empty on another bus that I rode so maybe local Vietnamese are aware of this issue and willingly choose to wait for the next bus rather than sweat the entire time. Sure it would have been nice to have air conditioning during the trip, but at the same time I did not want to wait around in HCMC for an afternoon bus to Mui Ne. Knowing what I know now, I still would have gotten on the bus, but if the ride was any longer than 4 hours, I would have waited to get a better seat with air conditioning on a later bus.