We drove from
Buon Me Thuot to Kon Tum in one day, passing through beautiful scenery, interesting villages, and many rubber plantations. About halfway to Pleiku, we stopped on the side of the road at a place made from small tree trunks, bamboo poles, and blue tarps to get a drink. I had a delicious bag of sugar cane and kalamansi juice, and we laid in the roadside hammocks for a while with traditional Vietnamese music playing in the background.
For lunch we stopped at a typical roadside restaurant that sold a great variety of “rice wine”. Throughout Vietnam it’s common to see jars of rice wine with snakes and scorpions, but this place also had wine with whole birds, feathers and all, geckos, lizards, mixtures of the above, and even a large jug with a hairless monkey! Both Tuan and Thanh said they had never tried this wine and wouldn’t dare to.
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Before getting a hotel room in Kon Tum, we drove just east of town to visit a Bahnar hill tribe village. The village had a very impressive “rong” house in the center, and was located on the bank of a river, where people were bathing, swimming, and washing clothes when we arrived. Unfortunately, the kids in this village did not look healthy. Several of them had bloated bellies, rashes, and sores on their faces. Spending time in this village was a great experience, and it was interesting to see people primarily living off the land in such beautiful environments, but also sad to see the lack of things we take for granted that would allow them to live a healthier life.
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After leaving the village we drove back to Kon Tum to our hotel/guesthouse, which was relatively clean. From there
Tuan took us to a really good vegetarian restaurant called Quan Com Chay, NGHiA 2. The food here was made from tofu, jackfruit, and other vegetables, and much of it was made to look like meat and fish. It was amazing how much the texture and appearance was like meat or fish, and the taste was excellent. When we walked into the restaurant our driver, Thanh, took an orange from the Buddhist altar after making a gesture toward it. I was surprised to see him take this orange from the altar, and when I asked him about it he said that “the Buddha had smiled already”. After dinner we went to the Eva Café and had some great drinks and fruit shakes.
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Before we left Kon Tum the next morning, we stopped at an orphanage with 220 children. We played with the kids for a while, before talking with a nun who ran the orphanage. Although the kids looked like they were well cared for, they had a distinctly different look on their faces from kids who lived with their families. It was sad to see all these children, realizing that there was not much hope for adoption there. We urge anyone traveling to Kon Tum to visit the orphanage and make a donation.
Just north of Kon Tum on Highway 14, we stopped at an abandoned former American and South Vietnamese air base near Charlie Hill. The villagers were using the air strips to dry manioc, and the smell of the baking manioc was strong. Our guide Tuan was invaluable. We learned so much from him about Vietnamese people, from our conversations with him, and from him translating for us with villagers throughout our trip. It was very interesting, standing on this old air strip, talking with him about the Vietnam War, or as the Vietnamese call it, the American War. After leaving the base, we drove on toward Phuoc Son.
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For information on Hotels, Tours, Flights, and Books on Vietnam, check out the pages below:
Hotels in Vietnam - Recommended hotels in Vietnam.
Tours in Vietnam - Recommended tour companies in Vietnam.
Flights to Vietnam - Includes information about our experiences on different airlines we've taken to and from Vietnam.
Books on Vietnam - Excellent books on Vietnam's history, people, and travel.
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