Day 28 Thurs 16 May - Cable car to Ba Na Mountains

It was such a warm day today and as we had to check out of Homestay decided to hire a vehicle and driver for the day for VD 1,500,000 ($90 approx) and head to the hills..... The Ba Na hills west of Danang.  The cable car ride holds 2 Guinness World records for the highest vertical rise in one section - 1,368 metres and the longest one section incline length - 5,801 metres.  It also has 11,587 metre Cable Car rope.... All that aside it was an amazing 25 minutes ride each way.  Unfortunately the day was hazy so photos were not as spectacular as we hoped.

    Incline number two of seven!

   It's not that high Les ... really!!!

    Heading to the top.

At the top there was a variety of sights from gaudy French style chateaux to Fantasy themed resort to a giant Buddha and Buddhist temple and Pagoda.  Another short cable car ride took us down to the Buddha and temples.

T 

   Smiling Buddha at Ba Na hills

   Two mini Buddhas Les and Kim

We stayed up the top for about three and a half hours and even visited fantasy world!  Couldn't resist a 4D ride on a Star Wars type ride for only VD30,000 - $1.80, and a tour around the glitzy "caves".

Back down the cable car to meet our driver at 4pm and into Danang to board the overnight train to Saigon (17 hours).  Had a couple of hours to wait so grabbed some tea at a street stall.... 

Lesley's first Pho and it was from a street stall......Delicious!!

Boarded the train just after 10pm and it was a quick rummage in the bags to get out the thermals and cardigans!, talk about cranking up the air conditioning we went from 30 plus to 15 degrees or at least that's what it felt like.  The boys got the top bunks nearest the fan while the girls snuggled under their blankets down in the bottom bunks.  The boys really are very nice!