::: Vietnam: Viethorse's return in a beautiful Sunday :)

[VietHorse]

I had 03 months plus unable to ride, not allowed to ride by Doctor. Yeah, I had my collar bone broken coz of a highside crash.
Now the titanium pin is still inside my bone.
However, per Doctor's advice, I have been doing quite many exercises, lately tried with swimming and feel good.
Right, I can be right back on the road with my gang.

----------------------------

Yeah, it was very sunny Sunday. Really really hot.
But that does'nt matter to my return on road.

As ussual, I departed very early. The street was almost nobody there.
At the meeting point:


My plan was getting to the new road/pass, which I missed due to the last accident.

Because of long time sitting home and so we lost our way at about almost 100km away from home.
We did not expected to go offroad like this:


Get this road in our mind, it will become a very good road soon. We 'll be back.


Found the right road, we had breakfast, had some coffee and also put some "coffee" to the bike::


Back on the road, the sun was raising, damn hot.
We stopped for a while before getting on the pass. We had some water and set up the Camera:




Three of us all sweaty:


We are ready now:


Yeah, it's my new VFR :


(to be continued...)

[HamboneSlim]

It looks really beautiful there, and perfect terrain for riding, with twisty hilly roads.

Is this northwest of Ho Chi Minh City? The map shows nice country around Cat Tien Park and north of Phan Thiet.

[VietHorse]

Originally Posted by HamboneSlim

It looks really beautiful there, and perfect terrain for riding, with twisty hilly roads.

Is this northwest of Ho Chi Minh City? The map shows nice country around Cat Tien Park and north of Phan Thiet.

Thanks HamboneSlim.
Yeah, I intended to show the tracklog at the end of the thread, however, I can put it here for your information.
There are two disconnected segment due to my GPS battery issue, however, you can easily figure it out:



(Ho Chi Minh City location is at the bottom left of the map)

[VietHorse]

Stop for a while near the hydro-power plant.






This view quite familiar if you follow my previous trip report:




Then ride, ride, and ride...
I am not so confident to take photos while riding like before. So, here I only have photos when we stopped.

Another stop beside the powerplant lake:


Yeah, Repsol is one of my favorite color scheme. Though of painting my VFR to Repsol once. However, RWB is my final decision:






(to be continued...)

[VietHorse]

Good morning guys from Vietnam.

Posting some more pix prior to going to work.
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Slowly ride to the place we can take some photos with the lake.

Yeah, it's here - the place marked as Photo site ( 11°18'49.00"N 107°53'27.69"E):





From there, we can see some small islands, they looked very impressive:




Yeah, let's spend some minutes for the show.



CBR1K Repsol version first:










Then the CB1KRRA limited:











Well, and the VFR 25th Anniversary :) :







Here we are :





(to be continued...)

[rogerdodger]

This is looking very nice. Wish I'd known about you guys when I visited Vietnam last year. Did a tour around Ho Chi Minh, Dalat, Mui ne then down to Phu Quoc. Definitely on my places to re visit soon. Looking forward to the rest of the ride report and maybe some more. roger

[Renegade 1 LI]

Looks really nice there, would love to check it out someday. I love the new bike! in fact I have the same one so it caught my eye. Is it hard to get bikes like that there? Seems like you & your friends always have some nice bikes to ride.

[Hominid]

Nice photos
Nice bikes
Nice countryside.

It looks like you guys had fun. Thanks for the photos and maps. I would love to tour that country with someone who knew the lay of the land. This report has me thinking of guided tours.

[VietHorse]

Thank you guys. Be here and experience yourself!

----------------

We ended the Bikeshow at almost 10:00AM.

Continued more than 30km to the lunch stop

10:26:06 we stopped at the Tam Chau - Bao Loc stop.


Look at his face, seemed satisfy:




And this guy, not really:


My dish for lunch:


Oops, don't tell me that 's elephant steak instead of beef steak:


Enjoy






Hahah, and this how the bikers they sleeeeeppp...:





(to be continued...)

[VietHorse]

Hey, wake up. Long way still ahead!!


@12:30, we done the gears and ready for the afternoon ride.

Slowly ride to the full fill the gas tank, then heading to the B40 and Loc Bac Pass.

About Loc Bac pass, that is my unforgetable memory.

The new road thru Loc Bac pass has just completely built May2011 and Govt just allow people to use since Q4 last year.

All the big bike riders in Vietnam know nothing about that road. I only heard about that when unintentionally talking with friend of my friend during a dinner. He is local there and said that the new road has been put in use.

Yeah, you may remember my crash I mentioned at the top of this thread - I have crashed on the way to explore this road. I had to be back to Hochiminh City when I had not reached the place I wanted to.

So that you know how does the Loc Bac pass mean to me. And so on to my feeling, it is really difficult to explain when almost getting there.

Leaving Bao Loc, we reached B40 first @ 13:15hrs:


The sign board says: "The B40 pass" - we have no idea why it called B40. But we can figured it was named as the US military fired a lot of B40 there. Ok, whatever.


The small sign says: Km 33 - Loc Bac pass 15Km (ahead)




We concentrated on the road with all the twisted elbow turns.

We could not take any overview photo like this:









13:30hrs, I get this - Straight to Loc Bac pass, Right to Hydro-power plan Dong Nai 4:


Olah lah... Here is the starting point of the Loc Bac Pass



We stopped here for a while to have some water.

I also checked the GPS and found that the batteries aready dead. Lucky me that I found it here. Went to the shop nearby to buy some batteries for replacement. All good.



Then we ready for Lộc Bắc pass.
Here I come!!!!

[VietHorse]

Thanks Ninjadoc. You must be here for a while?

Bellow here are some photos taken by my buddy.

It's me:



Repsol rider:



CB1K rider:



Setting the Cam:



Don't remember what I was doing. I may show him how large of the GoPro view. Hehe.



Road ahead:



Stopped at the powerplant wall:











2nd Stop:






(to be continued...)

[VietHorse]

About to reach Loc Bac pass, there were a lot of clouds coming.

I gotta change the helmet visor from iridium dark to clear visor to get more confident.

The road appeared very nice, clean, newly painted lane lines and sign boards.



Sometimes we saw some trucks coming downhill and bring some dirt with their wheels. The road surface get some dirt.

Knew that the landscape along the road very beautiful but we did concentrate on the twisty road, have no time to stop for photos. Let's do it next time.



Reached a quite open area, we slowed down and take a break with some water.





















Here is where we passed:


And this is waiting for us:




(to be continued...)

[VietHorse]

We finish the Loc Bac pass within about almost 1hr more.
Take two more stops for water prior to home.
I gotta change my leather jacket to the net jacket, coz I know that the nearer to my home, the worse traffic is.
Got home quite late due to the terrible speed we made within Hochiminh City. Imagine you on the VFR and ride more slowly than walking!!!

6:42PM at my home, done the 500km plus day trip:


Not a good tracklog as I have GPS battery issue, so, there are two disconnections on the route:


First trip of my return with not many buddies, however I can enjoy the twisty with several stops - it good for the one like me.
I have safely experienced the road which made me crashed last time. It's awesome when thinking like that.

Inside the house, my sweat still running like hell but very, really happy and satisfy with the nice return.



Thank you all my ACE MTSG buddies who being or not with me on road, thanks to ADV guys being with me here.
See you guys nex trip.

[JaxObsessed]

Great job! Thank you for the slice of life.

[ZLTFUL]

Jealous! Not only do the roads look great, you guys get all the best Pho I am sure!