Our homestay ‘Kadpul Homecation’ in Da Lat was awesome. We were in a loft, up a dodgy staircase, which was perfect for listening to the rain in the daily thunderstorms. Downstairs was a covered seating area adjacent to the garden where had access to unlimited green tea, woo!
We spent our first afternoon in Da Lat relaxing and playing exploding kittens downstairs. For dinner we went to a street food spot just up the road for beef fried noodles upon recommendation from the homestay host. They were delicious and cheap at only $1.50 a bowl, so we had two each. To round out the evening, we wandered around to a coffee shop for a hot chocolate and Oreo milkshake. Both were delicious and only $2 each. While inside the first thunderstorm struck and it started bucketing down. Luckily we made the most of a 10 minute gap in the rain and managed to get home dry.
Breakfast was included at the homestay. The first morning we had a green bean and corn concoction with some passion fruit juice and the second morning we had vermicelli noodles with bbq pork.
Over our two days in Da Lat we did a lot of walking to explore the area. Our first stop was the ‘Crazy House’ which started being built in 1990 and has undergone continual development ever since. It is designed to feel like you are living in the trees, so the building is plastered and painted to look like tree trunks and branches wrapping around each other. There are stairs through most of the branches which are very narrow and precarious to navigate! It felt like we were walking through a maze and it was great fun to explore.
The cable car was the next activity on our list. It was cheap at $5 a return ticket for a 10 minute ride. On the way there were stunning views over the hills and many glasshouses that are located all around Da Lat. We had intentions to explore the temples located on the other side of the cable car, however, on the way over along came another thunderstorm and it started pouring. We still made a quick sprint to the temple for a nosey but we couldn’t see much through the heavy rain.
Back at the homestay we played exploding kittens and drank green tea while we waited for the rain to stop. For dinner we went back to the same street food stall because it had been so good the first time! We had hoped to try the rice pancakes too but again they had sold out by the time we arrived.
The following day we had a night bus booked for 11 pm to HCMC. Luckily we were allowed to have a super late check out and stay in our room until then.
During the day we went for a walk around the lake. There were many people fishing, even though the lake was quite dirty and there were dead fish floating on the surface… We also spent a good chunk of time exploring the Big C supermarket that we passed on the way. It was huge!
Our final stop around the lake was at the flower gardens. There were some pretty impressive animal shaped bushes and a cool ‘old tree’ forest which were the highlights of our visit.
On the way home we welcomed thunderstorm number three and got soaked. We sat outside again drinking green tea and playing exploding kittens to dry off. We tried to wait for it to stop raining before going to dinner but by 6.30 pm we decided to head out anyway. We went back to our favourite street food stalls up the road, splashing through the flooded gutters as we ran to get out of the rain. This time they were still making rice pancakes, yay! They were good at only 70 cents a pancake, and we followed them up with another bowl of noodles. It was a fun experience eating a hot bowl of noodles under a tarpaulin in the pouring rain!
Kyley on Tour 