2 years driving through Mexico, Central America, and Colombia and I paid 0 bribes, 1 Hour driving in Vietnam and I am already losing the battle. Oh well, 20 bucks let me keep my bike, I think it was worth it.

Now, I am not claiming to be a master at avoiding bribes, but they certainly tried to get my money when I was south of the border.  Even when 2 Colombian cops stopped me and tried to sweat me out for 30 or so minutes, 1 of them making a slicing motion across his throat while telling me “I was in big trouble”, I never wavered…..but this time was different, this time I was unprepared.

My odometer is broken, distances from Google:
Ho Chi Minh City/Saigon to Cat Tien: 154KM
Cat Tien to De Lat: 164KM
De Lat to Nha Trang: 135KM
Nha Trang to Qui Nhon: 214KM
Vietnam total: 667KM (414 Miles)

As I had purchased the bike on a whim I had done no research on Moto travel within Vietnam for this trip, though it has been on my list of potential adventures so had previously looked into some of the aspects of it, but after buying the actual bike, I had no idea how to proceed, or much of what lay ahead for me.  Since traffic is on a another level in Saigon, I did some quick googling looking for the best way out of the city and read by heading north, rather than east, I could avoid some of the heavy traffic, as well as the corrupt cops that lie in between Saigon and Mui Ne.  This would give me about 2 hours of heavy traffic as opposed to 4, and since I had no plans to go to Mui Ne would minimize any cop related issues.  I did bring an international drivers license just in case I rented a bike in any of these countries, but I do not believe Vietnam recognizes these, there is a lot of confusion about it online, they seem to simply look the other way when it comes to foreigners on to wheels.

I headed North towards Cat Tien, leaving Saigon around 10am, as I had read traffic would not be bad since rush hour was coming to an end.  1 of many problems with the bike is that there is no speedomoter, so I cannot really say that I wasn’t speeding, but it was obvious why I was pulled over from the start.  I had started to pull over to the side of the road as I saw what I thought were food vendors setup down the road, and wanted to check my GPS since I am using my phone, and need to take it out of my pocket and check it every few minutes in the city traffic.  This obviously resulted in me SLOWING DOWN, but I then see it is a police check point, so I quickly put my blinker on and return to the main flow of traffic hoping to blend in, which clearly did not work.

I saw a cop get excited and wave his baton around indicating for me to pull over, oh shit.  He tells me I was speeding and I instantly argue, dammit I shouldn’t have spoke English now he knows we can communicate, I am clearly out of practice for this.  Again I was slowing down, so I was a bit pissed that this cop was clearly going to bribe me.  He tell me “Vietnamese license”, something I obviously do not have, but I grab my international license telling him it’s “international”.  He doesn’t object as he looks it over, but I didn’t get the impression he cared since he kept telling me it was 55kph. I agree telling him yes, 45 pointing to my bike since they don’t use radar guns, but again he doesn’t care.  In less than two minutes he makes it clear why he pulled me over….”monies, you go”.

Again I don’t know if this license had any weight, or what a Vietnamese jail is like, so I keep asking myself why I am arguing with him, but I cannot stop.  To keep this easy we will just go with USD, he tells me he wants 128USD.  I immediately laugh, state a firm no, and low ball him and counter with 4.30USD, I didn’t necessarily mean to go that low but when I threw out the amount in Dong, it took me a second to calculate what it was equivalent to but then stuck to my guns.  “NO, 128USD” he demanded.  “No, 4.30USD”, I am being pretty blatant with my No’s.  Sometimes I counter with “I am not paying”, and eventually he threatens to keep my license.  I should have acted like I was upset by this, but he could tell I didn’t care.  He lowers to 85USD, so I play the game and bump my offer up to 6.45 haha.  He gets mad, counters, and I drop it back down to 4.30.  That really pissed him off, so he threatens to take my bike.  This is all going on while we stand next to a flat bed truck, so I am asking myself if this is a bluff, or if my bike will end up in the back only 1 hour after its maiden voyage.  Meanwhile there are about 10 other cops pulling over locals left and right, they come and go quickly, it is quite the spectacle, but I am too preoccupied to see who is actually paying money, but it looks like everyone is getting shaken down.

I eventually tell him no and sit on my bike indicating I am done playing his game, this really pisses him off.  I think I could have used these tactics to my advantage as they do not want people seeing what they are up to, but really I have no idea how far I can push him, so listen to him when he tells me to get off the bike and come back over to him.  At this time, a cop pulls over someone else, and in true stereotypical fashion, a scooter driven by an Asian comes barreling in, almost colliding with 2 other cops.  1 of the cops gets pissed, and swings his baton at the guy.  I can’t tell if he was trying to hit him or just scare him, but decide maybe I should pay the bribe and get the F out of here, as he looked pretty serious.  I work my way to 20USD, which is probably still to high, and ignore his gesture to be nonchalant, pulling the bill from my wallet, holding it up for all to see verifying the amount as if I do not know what 500,000 dong is equivalent to, “500 yes??”.  Again, he gets pissed, but gets my money and tells me “you go now, you go”.  I slowly pack my bag up, taking my sweet as time, and pull out revving that little bike as much as it would go, looking down at my shifter acting like it was stuck as I pull away.  In hindsight I am actually surprised I didn’t find out what that baton felt like.

I get to Cat Tien in the afternoon, and word must have spread about the shakedown, as soon as I check in the woman running the hotel I stayed at gave me some cake!  Ok, so it might have been her birthday, but the cake was delicious aside from the candle chunk I found inside.  There was an Aussie guy with a German girl, so we took off for some dinner.  These two picked up bikes having little to no experience between the 2 of them.  Now I wont harp on it after this, but I have met way too many people doing this.  Vietnam is heavily populated, things are hectic, they do not drive well, constantly pull out in front of you, and the buses and trucks do not care about the motorcyclists.  Luckily everyone drives very slowly, but Vietnam really is not a place to be learning how to ride, I strongly suggest you rent a bike at home so you can focus on the bike and driving, without all the added challenges.

Cat Tien is a national park, but I had no plans on checking it out, so the next day I take off headed to De Lat, all I know about that place is it is located in the mountains, and is known for it’s nice cool climate, YES!  Vietnam has been hot, so I could use the change.  I didn’t leave super early, so with lunch, and stopping for photos I get in around 4pm.  Traffic was crazy in the city, turned out all the students were off so everyone had headed to town for some partying.  I do not know how it is normally, but it was crazy the day I got in.  To add to the chaos, there are lots of roundabouts, and I do not have a clue where I should be going.  I grab a hostel and am not impressed with De Lat at all, but the hostel was good, and I signed up for the “family dinner”.  They cooked those of us who signed up a nice meal, and we all got to know each other.  Everyone is going to go out for drinks, quite excited for it, but I am a bit tired so decline, asking myself why these people are so gung ho to go out on a Sunday.  I was still hungry after the meal so went walking for food, when I found a large area where they had closed off the streets, full of people, vendors, and food.  I am looking at a pizza treat of some sort I have not seen previously debating if I should try it, when some guys from Saigon who can speak a bit of English tell me it’s good, and to try it out.  They tell me the price so now that I know I am not going to get ripped off I sit down and enjoy the tasty treat.  They give me the low down on some things about Vietnam, and I eventually leave them to go find desert.  I walk around a bit s De Lat starts to grow on me.  I go back to the hostel ready for bed and find it empty aside from the person at reception, literally everyone has gone out, savages.  Well of course as has happened all to often in my previous travels I was off on my days, as it was Saturday night, which is why everyone wanted to go out so I missed out, oh well.

From De Lat I head to Nha Trang…”Russians”.  Well, that is the 1st word I hear anytime anyone mentions Nha Trang, which is a popular destination for Russian and Chinese tourists.  Everything I read says to skip it, I even got a tip or two on where I could go instead from people at the De Lat family dinner, but I wanted to check it out.  Plus the drive there took me over a pass where I got my 1st real taste of Vietnam’s spectacular scenery.  The previous days were fine, but nothing special, the pass, while brief, was great, and offered many photo opportunities, especially for newly weds apparently.  After some nice mountain roads I arrived in Nha Trang a bit early, so it wasn’t a terrible long day.  I grabbed a hostel, and naturally went out for food.  I grabbed myself a delicious burger, and I do not regret it!  Vietnamese food is fantastic, but sometimes, you need some comfort food, and anytime I finish a ride here in Vietnam I find myself craving burgers, and a good one is hard to find here.  I searched for a burger place since it is a large city, and when I saw so many positive google reviews I knew where I was headed.  I then walked the boardwalk, and just kind of wandered around.  I didn’t mind Nha Trang, and there are some beautiful Russian women which is a nice plus.  It also looked like it would have a decent night life, but I didn’t check it out, so just used it as a stopping place, something I do for most of Vietnam as that visa clock is always ticking.

The next day was a long drive, as I wanted to drive the ninh van bay peninsula to check out the recommendation from the family dinner group before continuing up the coast.  I had read it was great back in the day as well, but now it kind of sucks.  The drive out was a waste of my time, I only recommend it if you do not want to go to Nha Trang, and stay the night at the end of the peninsula….but to drive there and back round trip was a complete waste, and the area itself is filling up with resorts and condos, so has lots of construction going on…sadly I have missed the window on this place, which seems true for most of coastal Vietnam.  Everywhere that was worth checking out at some point is now being over run with construction and tourists.  Of course I live at the beach, so it is tough for me to get excited about them, maybe you will love them, but I wasn’t feeling it, but still had another day or two of the coastal route I planned to follow.  I then continued North which took me through some nice looking areas with fishing villages, passed blue ocean waters, and a good portion of boring old flat highway, until finally arriving in Qui Nhon late in the evening.

Qui Nhon was nice enough, a good sized small city, which people use as a base to check out beaches around the area.  I only spent the night, and pushed on towards Kon Tum, as it was time to leave the coast and start ridding in the mountains, where I constantly read the real fun begins.  This is where I will pick up the legendary Ho Chi Minh Highway, a system of roads which connect the Southern city of Saigon with the Northern city of Hanoi, and possibly goes all the way to China present day.  This road runs through the mountains which border Cambodia/Laos, and played a crucial role in the “America/Vietnam War”, but more importantly, had some great twisties and scenery for motorcycle riders.  I could have picked it up sooner, but wanted to see what the beach scene was all about.  I enjoyed the places I hit up, but would probably forgo them next time, but they were not bad in any way.  I also plan on heading back to hit the popular locations such as Hoi An, or De Nang, before fully committing to the mountains.

All photos provided in this post are prior to the trip to Kon Tum, so as you can see there is still some very scenic mountain riding where I went, and the beaches have their moments, but I found things generally got better the farther north I went.  Depending on how much time you have, I either recommend you start in Hanoi and focus only on the North, or start in Saigon like I did and head north.  Many people go North to South, and comment that while it is nice, they cant help be feel slightly disappointed after starting in such an amazing area of the North and working their way South.