Shanghai Sonshine: Chuc Mung Nam Moi!

After some smoggy days in Shanghai in early January we decided it would be good to bring in the Year of the Snake at the beach in Phan Thiet, Vietnam! With a 4 hour flight to Ho Chi Minh and then a 5 hour drive, we arrived at the Phu Hai Resort and have been surrounded by beautiful blue skies, sandy beaches, the South China Sea, pools and Russians ever since! We've spent mornings at the beach (where Joseph has progressed from not trusting standing by himself on the sand to running along the shore throwing all the shells back in the water!), afternoons in the pool and then gone into the local town Mui Ne for dinner. We've enjoyed some great Asian BBQ and a favorite restaurant is Jibes Kite & Wind Surfing Shop/Diner...on the beach, with a bunch of surfers (so quite the relaxed atmosphere!) and some of the best Western food we've had since moving to China!

A few of the fun happenings:

* The money situation has been interesting as one USD = 20,780 Vietnam Dong. So you get a bill for dinner and it is 625,000VND. And where in China the largest bill is 100RMB (worth about $12) here the largest bill (at least that we've had) is 500,000 (worth about $25). Takes a little getting used to!
* Given this was somewhat a 'last minute' trip, we didn't do as good prep as we should regarding the language...didn't know how to say anything and here way less people (Vietnamese and Russians alike) speak any English so communication has been a lot more challenging. We have learned hello and thank you...but that is the extent of our Vietnamese!

* Our first day on the beach included having 3 cows walk by (thankfully that hasn't happened again) and also a sweet elderly Russian lady who was holding a fish and then came over to give it to Joseph...we were all quite interested in how cute it was until we realized it was dead. Umm...let's go wash our hands, again!

We did take one day to tour the local sites...a fishing village (way cool with such rustic looking boats), the White Sand Dunes (most arid spot in all of Southeast Asia, where we also rented ATV's...which are VERY easy to get stuck in the sand!), the Red Sand Dunes (smaller than the white ones, with lots of local children there to get you to 'rent' a sled to slide down the dunes), and Fairy Stream (no idea where that name came from but you walk in the stream which is red from the canyons surrounding it with red sand/clay). Only cost 2,000,000VND for the entire day...including a Jeep ride to take us everywhere. Yes that's 5 hours, a Jeep ride for 7 people and 4 different local sites for $100...not a bad deal!