2,700 kilometers, 2 people, 1 Honda Win 100cc motorcycle, 3 bottles of sunscreen, and a desire for adventure = 1 trip down and up the coast of Vietnam. It's been 18 days since Son and I set off down Vietnam's oft-used Highway 1. Since so much has happened over the course of our trip and I can't possibly cram it all into one blog entry, I'm going to begin by explaining the most prevalent theme of our journey: The Road.
Highway 1 runs down along the coast of Vietnam... through mountain passes, along beaches, between rice paddies (no surprise there), and has become the focal point for many cities, both big and small. 
It is the most frequently travelled highway in the country, and it's dismal upkeep makes it a somewhat treacherous drive, which leads me to question why no one seems concerned with road maintenance. Pot holes and loose stones aside, the highway itself carries many functions in addition to transportation, and these various uses of the road was one of the most fascinating aspects of the drive. Here are just a few things that can be found on Highway 1:
-Unattended children doing whatever they want
-Unattended livestock doing whatever they want
-A vast array of goods drying on the shoulders (corn, peanuts, chilies, hay, coconuts... just to name a few)
-People standing around waiting for a ride
-Vehicles treating the road as their own personalized parking spot
-Social gatherings
-Various modes of transportation transporting a wide variety of materials/animals
-Men peeing with no regard for public decency
-Herding space
... no matter where we were in the country, we could always count on more than just vehicle traffic down Highway 1. The most amazing thing to me, was the way that people went about public transportation. If a Vietnamese person wants to take a bus somewhere, they simply stand on the side of the road, placing suitcases and bags in front of them as a call sign that they are in need of transport. There they would wait until a bus would roll by (they ranged from tiny vans to oversized sleepers) and, without ever coming to a complete stop, the vehicle would lumber to the side of the road at just the right speed for the prospective traveller to throw in their bags and hop onto the step. What makes this even more hysterical is the fact that picking up people on the roadside is illegal. Each bus has to report to the government how many seats they sold, but with the use of tiny stools, floor pillows, and bags of rice, the bus herder (the man who's job it is to hang out the door and find more passengers) can turn a 10 seater into a 20 seater, pocketing the extra money. Therefore, if buses are rolling alongside the road, preparing to pick someone up, and the police are nearby, shouts ensue, people start running in all directions, and the bus tries it's best to out-drive the authorities. Watching a bus overcrowded with people (this usually results in appendages sticking out of the windows), and loaded down with all sorts of bags on the roof try to manage escape is particularly funny, and ended up being one of my favorite sources of entertainment during the long hours of the drive.
On the other side of the spectrum, the way animals use the road is equally as interesting. 2 days drive outside of Hanoi, we were stopped short in our tracks as we came across 300 ducks, feet flapping against the pavement, moving in a very orderly fashion across the highway. We sat there motionless for a good 5 minutes watching them all run along, quacking and jostling to get to the other side. I'm kicking myself for not taking a photo of one of the most hysterical animal crossings witnessed on the trip. While ducks pose a minor threat to the average motorcyclist, cows and water buffalo prove a bit more dangerous. The shoulder of the road is meant for motorbikes and bicycles, while the actual highway is reserved for trucks, buses, and cars; this fact proves somewhat absurd when you have to dodge a large herd of cows that amble slowly along, seeming to have no concern for the high-speed vehicles passing at precariously close distances. Numerous cows and water buffalo tend to do their own thing (especially when their herder is not present, which is most of the time) and opt to cross the road for "greener pastures" on a whim. Meaning that in addition to dodging potholes, stones, refuse, children, and drying farm goods, one must also be able to dodge large animals at any given instant. Son did a particularly good job at this, and I give him a lot of credit for keeping me alive when a baby water buffalo decided to run out in front of our bike.
More to come on the actual details of our travels in the next post...
