Vietnam - Tim gets legless

After a few days of DIY tours we decided to go on an organised one to Monkey Island. This meant a coach trip for a few hours and several stop offs at local "attractions".

"Yummy" sea food

The first of these was a fish market which was Marks version of he'll, live fish, crabs and octopuses. Tim picked one up and nearly dropped it but juggled with it instead. We also went to the beach, now we've been to some beautiful beaches in our time; St. Lucia, Surfers Paradise, Mauritius etc. Well this one wasn't all that... in fact I'd even rate Blackpool above it. With it's subtle mix of mud and sand, and a sprinkle of pollution, it made us happy that the brown water was miles away.

A pair of monkeys

Back on the coach, out next stop was at a holiday resort. What it really was, was a dilapidated hotel with no guests. We had lunch there, well Tim had lunch there, Mark had some bread. We then looked around the place that doubled as the set from Mad Max and enjoyed our free time. What they expected us to do in our free time escapes us!

Finally we got the bus to Monkey Island and the trip quickly got better. Hundreds of monkeys lining the path and coming over to say Hello. We were told not to bring any food or drink, so it was no surprise that the Korean woman who had been annoying us all day came strolling off the coach eating nuts and carrying some drinks. 2 seconds later she was mugged of both, how we laughed. We got to feed the monkeys who like food more than Tim.

A little way on and there were some shallow water crocs. You could feed these too, and they can't half move when they want to!

Speedboats next, we were hoping that they'd let us drive but they're not that crazy. It was 7 to a boat but the stupid Korean woman couldn't count so we switched boats to even them out and get away from her.

We then took the speedboat down a tight river, and encouraged the driver to do it at full throttle to which he obliged, although at the next blind bend a boat was coming the other way and we had a bit of a crash.

Tim was later taken captive as a POW

This took us to a Vietcon village from the war that more resembled an Ewok village. We explored this and commentated on the lack of health and safety as some of it looked a bit dodgy. A few seconds later, the floor gave way on Tim and his leg went through. Luckily Mark was there though else we may not have gotten a photo. After taking pictures with the camera, iPhone and little camera, Mark helped him out and the rest of the group caught us up to lend a hand. It's a good job this didn't happen earlier at the croc pen else Tim would now be known as Peggy. We think that it must have been a trap left by the Vietnamese to hurt the murderous Americans. Our tour guide was concerned and asked if he cried, and then told him to lose some weight, the sympathy was overbearing!

Our tourguide (smaller than us)

On the way back, despite being injured we tried to push the Korean woman in with the crocs but she managed to slip away. Tim now hates her more than Tom Daley which is saying something.

Our tour guide was amazed by how tall we were and had a photo of us. It turns out that we're still tallest. She was that amazed by our height that she had a photo taken with her phone by an Aussie who it appears has never used a phone since the 80s. She loved it so much she emailed us a copy.

On the night we had an easy one, some food at a place just down the road and then stuck to beers. No rocket fuel cocktails or 3 litres of Red Bull tonight. We chilled out and played some cards and then sauntered back to the hotel shortly after midnight stopping only for Tim to have some octopus grilled for him, for all we know, it could have been the same one that he was juggling earlier this morning...