Motor Biking and Exploring the Ho Chi Minh Trail

By Myths & Mountain trip guest Jim Kirksey

(written to a friend)

You asked about my Vietnam trip, I will try to give you a short overview.

Left Corpus Christi Feb. 18th for Houston, San Francisco, Taipei arriving Hanoi around noon Feb, 20. Changed planes at Taipei where a sign over the terminal entrance says "the penalty for having drugs is death." I was met at the airport by Le Van Cuong, our tour guide, who turned out to be the best you could ask for. He fought on the Viet Cong side for five years so he was able to give us the perspective of the war events from both sides. Cuong, and all persons with whom we came in contact with for the duration, were friendly, humble, and without resentment. The attitude seems to be the country has been at war with somebody for 1000 years so the American War (their term) is only a blip on their historical screen. The high percentage of the current population was born after the war. They are beautiful and busy young people working hard to elevate Vietnam from its current Third World status. They have a ways to go. They are a proud, self respecting, clean, ambitious, disciplined, and busy generation.

The Vietnamese consider themselves as a capitalistic/communist society but for the most part, communism is benign and in appearance only, with capitalism extremely active and the rule with private investment obvious. The whole six mile length of China Beach is scheduled for tourist oriented development as well as the Mekong Delta area.

The five of us on the trip were introduced and dined the night of the 20th in Hanoi. The next day was spent seeing the sights of Hanoi including the Hanoi Hilton (a terrible place built by the French). We got the Ho Chi Minh indoctrination and tour. I was not impressed with Hanoi. We had dinner again that night and then boarded an overnight train that took us to Vinh. Our motor bikes and support team met us there early the next morning and we headed out to the "Trail".

A few places along the Trail are still pretty much in the original state but most of it has been upgraded to various degrees and by-passed in some cases for more convenient travel. However, there is no problem in experiencing it like it was. It is our opinion that we rode on or through every possible road surface conditions possible - except ice.

The trail route took us in to Laos for some distance but without problems. The Trail route runs in and out of Laos with branches that run into Vietnam. The North/South distance of the Trail seems to be around 1,100 miles but the total length of it is said to be 2,600 miles. (See map on Internet if interested) The Trail runs mostly in the center and western part of the country and is remote from the populated areas and commerce. It was my feeling that some of the village people along the way may not have ever seen a Caucasian person before our group. The children were intrigued. We gave out "Big Chief" writing pads and pencils and other small toys and they were thrilled. They live the most humble life. They say there are 56 different dialects spoken by various genetic mixtures of inhabitants in these remote areas.

It is our estimate that we likely saw 90% more of Vietnam than a normal tourist sees when they come to Saigon, Hanoi, Da Nang or etc. The Country is mostly mountains and hills covered with tropical growth. The landscape was more pleasant and suited for agriculture in the South than North. I preferred the South in every respect. There are many clear rivers that run from the West to East to the China Sea.

Climate varies up and down the length of the country with changes probably due more to varying altitude than anything else. It is never very cold except in the North where it can get down to 40 (degrees F) or so. We were on the coast of the Sea of China only once and that was at Da Nang. China Beach is beautiful and virgin at this time. It reminded me of South Padre Island prior to development.

Our accommodations included everything from cots and mosquito nets to 4 star hotels. There were a few times when we had no hot water or other services but it was all part of the experience and fun. In the best of hotels you are allowed only 10 gallons of hot water so my roommate and I had to be considerate.

There were five of us plus Cuong, the guide, and the support team, a truck driver and a mechanic. My roommate was a 65 year old retired pharmacist from Seattle. There were two, forty five year old home builders from New Jersey, and a retired 60 year old gentleman from Connecticut. They were all great people and a pleasure to share our experience together.

We were fortunate in having only two accidents. The first was a "slip down" due to a mud slide on a road surface and the second was when I had to go down to avoid being hit by a truck. There are no driving rules in Vietnam. We were told the code is to drive however or wherever it is the most convenient. It results in an unbelievable scene in congested areas.

We were 50 miles from the termination of our trip when I went down. They patched me up and the mechanic had worked on the bike to the point that it would run, minus a few parts, so Cuong changed his mind and let me ride it on in so I could have the satisfaction of completing the whole trip. My injuries are superficial and almost healed. No broken bones.

The trip terminated at Dalat since they said the traffic was too bad to ride the last 100 miles in to Saigon. They drove us in a very comfortable Mercedes van. We spent the next day and half seeing Saigon, the tunnels, the garden bar on top of the Rex Hotel, etc. and then we all caught our various flights home on March 6. Greatest adventure of my life!

I forgot to mention that at one village they put us on elephants that took us across a lake to a village near the Cambodian border.

Click here for link to the trip Jim took.