Day 78 Night train to Danang (Hoi An)

There were hundreds of people carrying everything but the kitchen sink on the train tracks that night. As the slow old train pulled in at 10pm we were a little anxious to find out who else would be in our 4 berth cabin. Cramped dark corridors illuminated by street light lead us to the locked door of cabin number 7 where we waited. It only took a few minutes until we realised that we had been locked out by our cabin partners who had boarded the train in Ho Chi Minh City. It took another few minutes for our knocks to be answered by stifled groans and the doors opened...I immediately felt terrible as the old lady hobbled back into her bed, at her feet curled a little girl wrapped in a bumble bee towel. On the opposite bed lay another frail little  lady with wispy white hair holding her hand up to block the light that flooded in when we opened the door. We quickly and quietly settled on the top bunks and I could sense that Mike was secretly relieved that the people below us would prove to be no threat in the night. It was pretty chilly on our top bunks as we were close to the air con unit. After we managed to put on almost every item of clothing sleep came quite quickly...we would wake up in the morning and be in Danang a few hours later (or so we thought). It was 4.30am when they started and Vietnamese are not quiet communicators...I know my Nana wakes up at this time, but she lays in bed and listens to News talk ZB, QUIETLY!! It was half an hour of what seemed liked heated discussion until the curtains were violently drawn at first light. Then it was food preparation, the kitchen pantry was reviled and breakfast was served consisting of noodles, soup and fruit. Mike and I stared in disbelief as the little bumble bee girl woke for food then fell back into a deep sleep. It was 5.30am and there was no way we were getting any more sleep. The loud conversation continued throughout the morning, music was played, train staff pushed carts of chicken soup through the carriage as we watched central Vietnam unfold. Thats when I truly saw green for the first time.  Not one natural thing is ever exactly the same, and that goes for colours. I doubt that any man could ever recreate the colour of a Vietnamese rice paddy boarded by the bluest sky on a hot summers morning, it's simply breathtaking. After admiring the countryside it didn't take much to realize we were running late, we just didn't know it was 7 hours late. That's when the nightmare set in, it was truly frustrating being stuck in that cabin. Bumble bee girl was our inspiration, quiet and well behaved, finding small things to amuse herself, staring patiently out the window. If she could do it so could we...and we did. At 4.30pm that afternoon, 18 hours later we arrived.