Welcome to Cambodia (98km)

Up at 6am again with baguettes and omelette for breakfast, the French legacy still going strong, then it was a long and quite difficult morning of cycling towards the Cambodian border. Mostly flat again but long and straight, greeted all the way by the tiny kids running to meet us on the street and scream 'hello' at us. It never gets old.
The heat was well over 40 degrees as we arrived at one of the most striking and bizarre border crossings I'm ever likely to see. Lots of pre-cast concrete but on an epic scale, complete with intricate decorations, imposing columns and lots of flags. A bit grubby and tired up close, though.
We had VIP visas, which seemed to boil down to good old fashioned bribery, but it let us wander past the queues of Vietnamese and Cambodians waiting patiently. They seem a very patient, sedate, unruffled set of peoples as a general rule.
Then it was headlong into Cambodia, the difference in poverty levels striking. Cambodia is exceptionally poor - yet everyone we meet has a huge smile and a lovely approach to life. The kids in particular are gorgeous and they're all fascinated by the 20 odd fat white people in orange shirts on bikes.
It's oddly humbling to see how, at least at the very superficial level we experience them, Cambodians seem to get by with a huge grin with next to nothing to their names.
There are very few towns or even villages, just little pockets of shacks every few miles with very little happening other than women preparing food and kids running around. There is a noticeable lack of older people and teenagers, the first apparently accounted for by Pol Pot's genocide, the latter by I have no idea what.
We eventually managed the 98km and stumbled to dinner, stuffing our faces for the 10th time that day and throwing a few beers back before collapsing into bed in a stupor.

Day one: Heading for the border (70km)

Quadrophenia, Nam-stylee!

Last night saw us complete a chaotic Vespa tour of Vietnam visiting some of the sights of Saigon: the Post Office (designed by Gustave Eiffel of Eiffel Tower fame), Notre Dame Cathedral (the oldest Catholic church in Saigon), the Reunification Palace (which celebrates the reunification o North and South Vietnam) and, obviously, a bar.
Saigon by moped is mostly terrifying, partly breath-taking and entirely exhilarating. But exhaustion was kicking in so it was a couple of beers at the end and we were all burst.
Today kicked off at 6am, me and Dee my roommate stumbling into life before packing and heading for breakfast: fruits of various descriptions, mostly unrecognisable and all delicious; steamed pork; chilli noodles; raw fish. A challenge at 6am.
Then off to the famous Cu Chi tunnels where we mopped up the propaganda and the sheer power of the story - if you don't know anything about them, it's worth a a Google.

Then on we cracked, rattling along at a leisurely pace for the next half before stopping for some food and drinks. Then another hour and lunch. More calories in than out, to be fair.
The last stint through rubber plantations and paddy fields was in severe heat before we reached a stunning lake and cycled alongside it for a few miles. A quick pitstop and a few sneaky beers between us then it was the last drag into the hotel with  few of us high tailing it flat out till I felt sick. The sun was going down behind a mountain and the temperature fell a few degrees. A few glorious miles before we reached the hotel.
A relatively straightforward first day, rounded off with dinner and some 3 litre 'towers' of Tiger beer and an earlyish night.

That's the hard part done...

A380 plane - we're not messing about here.

So we've finally arrived. Approximately 24 hours after we all rose yesterday morning to head to Heathrow, 20 odd of the convenience and grocery trade's finest are finally here in Ho Chi Minh City, or Saigon as the locals still prefer to call it. The previous 24 hours are a mostly a blur of endless meals, almost endless drinks (though we did literally drink the plane dry of beer *beams*), endless in-flight
movies and trying to sleep with varying degrees of success.
But we're here now although it's now only about 4pm in the day so we have another 6 or 7 hours before we can crash.
The stopover in Singapore was memorable only for the torrential rain and the fact that one of our team, Dee Patel, had the bottle of vodka he bought at Heathrow forcibly removed from his person as he tried to board the flight to Vietnam.
Saigon is a blaze of noise, smells and colours - but mostly noise. A wall of unending, chaotic car horns and whistles that never, ever abates. And the heat hits you too. Late 20s today but it rose over the next hour as we went to have lunch and then get fitted for our bikes. Mostly proper mountain bikes, a bit bashed up, but decent quality - Giant and Specialised mostly.

Vietnam: moped country

Crossing a road was another experience. I remember it from my honeymoon last year but it's an entertaining experience to watch a gang our size try to get through what has to be some of the craziest traffic on the planet. Slow and steady is the advice from our guide, and whatever you of, don't stop and don't run.
When we got to the hotel the temptation to sleep was overwhelming but I doubt we'd have managed to get back up. So it's a shower, a walk and a couple of beers to get acclimatised to the wonderful world of Vietnam. Then it's dinner and a Vespa tour of the city and a few bars.
What could possibly go wrong?