Steve Perry's got nothin' on my jouney

So I'd like to paint a picture for you. It concerns the modes of transportation and level of gag-reflex control that it took to get over to this incredible island.

We awoke at six in Chau Doc to pack our bags and get a little something to eat before heading out yesterday morning. Breakfast was simple and the heat was already invading when our "bus" pulled up outside of the hotel. It was actually the equivalent of a Volkswagon Vanagon and Heather and I were the ninth people to get on. The road to Rach Gia I was told would take three and a half hours so I assumed that this was just a shuttle to get us to the bus depot. but we continued to pick more people up and headed further outside of the city. I maybe have let on a little too much there and ruined the surprise which is that this "bus" was going all the way. Not so terrible since it was overcast and a bit rainy, which brought a cool breeze through the interior. But it seemed like there was no limit to how many passengers this caravan would include. Soon we had sixteen people crammed inside and hurtling along, horns-a-blarin'. It became a bit of a jig-saw puzzle as we came upon more people. Some had to get off to reconfigure the load and everyone squeezed in just a tiny bit more. At last count there were twenty-one people in what was morphing into a Vietnamese clown car. And they were alowed to smoke. Anyway, it was about this time that, predictably, we scored our first and unbelievably last flat tire. But even with all the stops and the single tire change it only took three and a half hours. How could they have known.

And then we are in the middle of Rach Gia and need to make our way to the Ferry which we have no idea how far it is or where it might be. Obviously we need a ride but the only available option is the back of a scooter. Two people on a little scooter seems dangerous enough but we were still carrying our over-weighted packs and it continued to rain down. The only thing that made me feel even a little at ease was the image I held in my mind of a family of five riding a single scooter down a very busy and not so flat highway just a day earlier.

Now were at the boat Ferry which was given the unfortunate name of SUPERDONG 1. It's a fast boat that takes us from the mainland and across the ocean to the East side of the island Phu Quoc. I thought that it would be an awesome ride, chilling on the bow, staring out at nothing, on a smaller version of an American ferry. No. It was the Vietnamese equivalent of Greyhound but really fucking fast. I should have known that this was going to be a rough ride from the smell of puke all over the floor behind me. But would I have not gone? No. So we get out of port, crammed in tight and this thing takes off right out of the gate and soon enough the waves are big and it's tossing the boat around, smacking the hull like a steel drum. At times it felt like we were boating down a gravel pit and I thought to myself how ironic it would be if we had fretted about the flight over only to die in a boat crash. This I shared with Heather to her dismay. But obviously we made it and I didn't have to use the barf bags that they were handing out.

So from the port at Phu Quoc we caught a real taxi to the other side of the island and it's unspeakably gorgeous. So private and quiet and our room is only twenty yards off the sea. The food is incredible and I think that I would like to die here. But we will be flying back to Saigon.