Due to the imminent holiday, we had only one bus option to get to Hue from Nha Trang. The overly flirtatious man who sold us the tickets, in between glances down at his game of Clash of Clans, told us our four seats were the last on the bus and that we were lucky to be in the back where there is more room for backpacks. Sweet… well… just wait. We paid for our overpriced foreigner rate bus tickets and hoped for the best. Two days later we were prepared for our 16 hour overnight bus ride and waiting in the lobby of our hotel. The company was supposed to pick us up at 6:15pm for the 7:00pm bus. 6:15 came and went. The woman working at the front desk of the hotel called four times to ask if the company was coming to pick us up. The first three times they said just wait. During the fourth phone call they said to hurry up and take a taxi to their office. We were all a bit rattled because we were cutting it so close and if we missed the 7:00 pm bus there would be a good chance of being stuck in Nha Trang for over a week. I can’t stress enough that travel in Vietnam before and after Tet is difficult.
We arrived just in time to line up to board our sanitary, spacious, and oh so comfortable bus. That last sentence was dripping with sarcasm. I have done a lot of overnight transit throughout my travels and this bus ride was by far the most horrible and insane of all. We had to take off our shoes and put them in plastic bags as we shuffled down the tight aisles to our seats at the back of the bus. The seats were kind of like bunk beds in that there was one on the floor of the bus and one directly above it, which was reached by a small ladder. All seats were in a permanent pseudo recline. One of the most uncomfortable aspects of these seats was that where you put your feet was a narrow and shallow tunnel. I stand just shy of 5’7’’ and it did not accommodate my legs let alone those of someone taller. So just picture the four of us nicely snuggled together lying shoulder to shoulder, but wait the back of the bus had five seats abreast. Meaning my brother got to know a very nice French woman named Miriam very well. We were all thankful that she was a polite person and more importantly petite.
Things started off stuffy, but we were all jovial. How bad could it be, right? Well, we stopped shortly after we hit the road and a horde of locals boarded. Apparently, first class tickets give you a seat and second class tickets allow you to sit on the floor. They boarded so quickly that I didn’t even have time to grab my backpack from below my seat. I had assumed that no one would be able to sit in the storage area, but I was wrong. Three men were crammed in the confined space and didn’t even bother to move my bag and just lay on top of it. As I kneeled to request my bag, I noticed the very agitated (understandably so) Albanian we had met earlier cradling his crying baby. It is hard to imagine that he had to hold that little boy in that tight space with all those strangers huddled on the floor next to them, for the next 24 hours (did you notice the a discrepancy in time…).
Less than an hour outside of Nha Trang the bus decided to breakdown. With no explanation whatsoever our luggage was thrown from the bus along with a dead chicken onto the oil stained pavement. For four hours we all milled about and hoped that another bus was on its way. Somehow someone speaking from the other end of a very dirty cell phone had walked the driver through how to get the bus up and going. We took up our posts without complaint. Unfortunately, this delay meant that the bus driver was not willing to stop for bathroom breaks. Throughout the night there were several instances where he pulled over to pee and so I hopped up and stepped off the bus to go alongside him (I purposefully wore a dress). He smacked my butt and said, “No!” Thus, I was greatly in need of a bathroom for most of the night.
My brother was kept up by something else entirely. The driver was driving extremely erratically. A huge chunk of the route hugs the coastline and Tim was wide awake monitoring our driver’s inability to properly make turns. The squid boats with their bright lights felt way too close for comfort. In Vietnam cars, buses, and scooters use their horns constantly as if to say, “I am here… I am still here…. Yep still here!” Our driver was no different. He passed on curves and aggressively blared his horn at those inconveniently in the correct lane ahead of him.
The next day, we obviously missed our arrival time of 11:00 am. We were all starving and in need of a toilet when our bus unexpectedly pulled off the side of the road next to a random cemetery. Again our bags were aggressively thrown from the bus with no explanation. Another bus came along and its passengers were ushered off in confusion. For some unknown reason we were switching buses and when you think it can’t get worse it always does. The interior of this new bus was coated in dust and had sharp metal sticking out of the seats. So the mayhem continued all the way to Hue.
Finally in Hue 24 hours after we started, we all felt like Jell-O. Between threats of future abuse, my brother swore to not board another bus in Vietnam. Well, he wasn’t going to have much of a choice.
We arrived just in time to line up to board our sanitary, spacious, and oh so comfortable bus. That last sentence was dripping with sarcasm. I have done a lot of overnight transit throughout my travels and this bus ride was by far the most horrible and insane of all. We had to take off our shoes and put them in plastic bags as we shuffled down the tight aisles to our seats at the back of the bus. The seats were kind of like bunk beds in that there was one on the floor of the bus and one directly above it, which was reached by a small ladder. All seats were in a permanent pseudo recline. One of the most uncomfortable aspects of these seats was that where you put your feet was a narrow and shallow tunnel. I stand just shy of 5’7’’ and it did not accommodate my legs let alone those of someone taller. So just picture the four of us nicely snuggled together lying shoulder to shoulder, but wait the back of the bus had five seats abreast. Meaning my brother got to know a very nice French woman named Miriam very well. We were all thankful that she was a polite person and more importantly petite.
Things started off stuffy, but we were all jovial. How bad could it be, right? Well, we stopped shortly after we hit the road and a horde of locals boarded. Apparently, first class tickets give you a seat and second class tickets allow you to sit on the floor. They boarded so quickly that I didn’t even have time to grab my backpack from below my seat. I had assumed that no one would be able to sit in the storage area, but I was wrong. Three men were crammed in the confined space and didn’t even bother to move my bag and just lay on top of it. As I kneeled to request my bag, I noticed the very agitated (understandably so) Albanian we had met earlier cradling his crying baby. It is hard to imagine that he had to hold that little boy in that tight space with all those strangers huddled on the floor next to them, for the next 24 hours (did you notice the a discrepancy in time…).
Less than an hour outside of Nha Trang the bus decided to breakdown. With no explanation whatsoever our luggage was thrown from the bus along with a dead chicken onto the oil stained pavement. For four hours we all milled about and hoped that another bus was on its way. Somehow someone speaking from the other end of a very dirty cell phone had walked the driver through how to get the bus up and going. We took up our posts without complaint. Unfortunately, this delay meant that the bus driver was not willing to stop for bathroom breaks. Throughout the night there were several instances where he pulled over to pee and so I hopped up and stepped off the bus to go alongside him (I purposefully wore a dress). He smacked my butt and said, “No!” Thus, I was greatly in need of a bathroom for most of the night.
My brother was kept up by something else entirely. The driver was driving extremely erratically. A huge chunk of the route hugs the coastline and Tim was wide awake monitoring our driver’s inability to properly make turns. The squid boats with their bright lights felt way too close for comfort. In Vietnam cars, buses, and scooters use their horns constantly as if to say, “I am here… I am still here…. Yep still here!” Our driver was no different. He passed on curves and aggressively blared his horn at those inconveniently in the correct lane ahead of him.
The next day, we obviously missed our arrival time of 11:00 am. We were all starving and in need of a toilet when our bus unexpectedly pulled off the side of the road next to a random cemetery. Again our bags were aggressively thrown from the bus with no explanation. Another bus came along and its passengers were ushered off in confusion. For some unknown reason we were switching buses and when you think it can’t get worse it always does. The interior of this new bus was coated in dust and had sharp metal sticking out of the seats. So the mayhem continued all the way to Hue.
Finally in Hue 24 hours after we started, we all felt like Jell-O. Between threats of future abuse, my brother swore to not board another bus in Vietnam. Well, he wasn’t going to have much of a choice.
