Our last full day in Da Nang starts with in a leisurely tempo, no alarms to wake us up, and no strict agenda for the day. We have a couple of things we want to get done today, but first – breakfast! Téa and I try to sneak out, but Maylin wakes up and then Joe is awake as well. The girls and I head up first, and Joe joins us shortly thereafter.
The girls are working on their typing skills while Joe tries to edit some videos, so I am able to sneak away for a bit to catch up on blogging. I head up to the 25th floor restaurant, and startle the poor lonely server. I have the place to myself, and ask for a coconut coffee.
After a while, another hotel guest arrives, the server’s colleague arrives, a manager arrives, and you’d think the server knows she’s working. I still startle her when I go to pay my bill and head back downstairs. I think she was too busy watching her nail polish dry. Someone should really label nail polish with a warning: “Will stink up an entire restaurant, no matter how much you try to hide what you’re doing.”
Once I’m back down in the hotel room, we get ready and head out for lunch. Joe wants to take us for a little bit of a walk through a residental neighbourhood before we get to where we are going, and his route takes us past this venue:
We walk to a place called Grandma Vuong’s Banh Mi Cha Lua Paté, and are greeted by the tallest Vietnamese person I’ve ever seen, who speaks American and grew up in Texas. His grandma’s paté has been hometown famous since the late 60’s, and now he’s helped her open the Da Nang location. Lucky for us, his grandma really knows what she’s doing with her food!
At this point, we were about half way to the beach, so of course I talk the others into walking the rest of the way with me! We haven’t been to the famous Da Nang beach for real, and won’t spend the day there today either, but I do want to see it in the sunshine, at least.
We walk along the beach for a bit, thinking we might stop somewhere if we find ice cream, but in the end we book a car to take us to the café that Téa and I have been wanting to visit for a week now. The taxi drops us off at yet another unassuming café, that turns into a magical garden once we enter.
After the café it’s getting later in the afternoon. We have to head home, pack a bit, find some dinner and then get to bed. Tomorrow’s alarm is already set for way too early.
Our bags aren’t that bad, but the HK express baggage restrictions are ridiculous. We’ve had to add a 4th checked bag with a maximum weight limit of 32 kilo, so that’s all packed and ready for the morning. We’re checking 4 suitcases, and have had to pay for two pieces of cabin baggage. Each ticket only includes a small personal bag to fit under the seat in front, and even if you pay for a bag to go into the overhead compartments, the two together can only weigh 7 kilos… To say it’s a headache and a difficult puzzle is a major understatement.
We leave the suitcases open and unresolved, and head a couple of doors down to have dinner. We’ve walked by this restaurant a few times, always wondering what the wooden structures are all about. It’s a Korean BBQ restaurant, and there’s a chain on the top of the structure, to hold a hot pot above the gas flames, I’m guessing? We order a BBQ combo set, with four different meats, and a dish of deep fried, sticky rice stuffed squid.
Our server uses the wooden structure to support herself while reaching for the grill in the middle of our table, so I think that’s what it’s there for. She struggles with the meat sticking to the grill surface, and she asks her colleague to bring over a newly oiled grill a couple of times, before she finishes cooking our meat. There’s pork, beef and mushroom rolls, chicken wings and beef. It’s all served with lettuce and herbs to roll them up with, and dipping sauces so spicy, my entire mouth is on fire!
Once I douse the flames in my mouth, we declare dinner over and done with, and head home. Everyone has one last shower, I pack the rest of the suitcases as best as I can, and in the end we shrug our shoulders and decide to see what they say at check-in in the morning… I mean, we have one large suitcase over the 20 kilo limit and our two cabin bags that combined with our backpacks exceed the limit of 7 kilos, but otherwise we’re very compliant! Wish us luck, please…
Hvilke fantastiske dager dere har hatt i Da Nang!
Ja, der var det deilig!