Jungle Beach and all its pleasure

I rented a motorcycle for $3 a day and road happily out of the tourist trap of Nha Trang to the glorious beaches that awaited me 60 kms away. Ricky decided to stay with our hosts and get a cheap Open Water then Advanced SCUBA certification, which was pretty cool - but I just had to get away. Jungle Beach was my destination, a small resort about 10 years old started by a Canadian ex-pat who renounced "the -10 degree Celsius winters of Northern Canada about twenty years ago" and stumbled upon a sleepy fishing village twelve years ago accessible only by boat. The beautiful drive circumventing the mountains lining the coast on a newly paved road which was doubling as a Vietnamese movie set the day I was cruising it on moto (I found this out by being yelled at by Vietnamese police to slow down when I was hitting 85 km 10 feet away from the movie set). The picturesque view if this new, nice road reminded me of the better parts of the Pacific Coast Highway, but with the twist only Vietnam can bring. Fishing boats dot the shoreline, achored but waiting for the early morning to cash in on the sea's crop. An abandoned Russian beach complex, now deluxe squatter city, held the one of the best beaches I past and a romantic view from the road with limestone and green filled islands finishing up the horizon of the deep blue sea. I felt freshly alone and eager to get to a place like this, and the feeling was only intensified by a big road only shared by a movie crew and a teenage lovers cuddling on their motorbike, reveling in the view. One of the best things about Vietnam is once your out of a tourist town - you are OUT. Villages make up the rest of the country and it helps bring a charm like nothing else. After a blissful ride on My New Favorite Road, the adversity that is required to get anywhere worth it struck. Its name is Highway 1 and we met and faught again for 30 kms, just as I had done in days past while riding through the central highlands via motorbike. This hell highway takes no mercy with trucks barreling at you on both sides of the roads, cutthroat tour buses that show a near disdain for human life, leaving us, the proletariat class of the road, just trying to get to work, school, or private beaches (in my case) trembling in fear on our measly 125cc motorcycles and bicycles. I clinched to the side of the road, singing happy Minus the Bear rock songs to keep my focus and prayed that I would see the Hyundai port sign soon. After some self doubt and an excruciating 40 km, Hyundai-Vinashin road welcomed me off the highway and on to a rice paddy lined street, quiet and calm, light years away from Dante's worst nightmare. A twist and turn, a dirt road, a aforementioned sleepy fishing village (still sleeping at dusk) and I had arrived at the bamboo gated "Jungle Beach". Workers greeted me with a open gate, fresh lemon water, and the owner showed me a brisk walking tour he could do in his sleep from memory. The setting matched the movie - The Beach, but with a more realistic appeal. I set my things down, noted the hour I had before dinner and went directly to the beach. This beach was our beach, home to the 25 occupancy Jungle Beach guests with nothing but warm sand in a few kilometers in both directions. The beach was like a bay, but with out the funny smelling water Mui Ne had and twice the amount of untouched sand. The familiar limestone/plant mix of islands were directly off the coast, which swept with lush, lush mini mountains that created our cove reserved only for us. I ran full sprint into the water, crashed over a small wave and fell backwards, arms wide open looking to embrace the multi colored sky and the perfect temperature in the water. Bliss like this doesn't come like this every day. I swam, did some evening yoga, went for a run and then just sat and watched a mountain of a cloud billow up catching the last of sun's rays of purple, blue, orange, yellow and pink. I had made it. Made it to my spot that I hoped and hoped and hoped that Vietnam would deliver, and it was here in that moment that I laughed from deep in my heart at how ridiculously beautiful this place is. I headed back to the compound thinking about how relaxing this would be and how I could get back into good shape with the absence of alcohol, peaceful running everyday, a little adventuring to see the monkeys in the jungle and a yoga practice morning and evening. Then I met Beth. and Justin. and Meegan from NZ. And three wild canadians. and the couple from Australia. and the couple from Hong Kong. Plans changed after that. Dinner was excellent, as was most of the 3 meals a day included which were always on one long friendly community table at designated times a day. This table introduced me to my good friends who I would spent most of my hangovers with and go on several excursions with. After some light talk, drinking games commenced with the Canadians, Beth, Justin and Meegan and by 11:30 p.m. Justin and I were fighting to stay away and stupured back to our huts, more than ready to leave the party behind. We got into a rhythm- all of us - strong coffee and plans made in the morning (11am), lunch at noon (which we were usually still at the table from breakfast), adventures - waterfalls, beach lounging, swimming, a mock wedding (created after an argument whether a couple can or cannot get hitched at sea by a captain) where I was the captain/priest. The evening was filled with hours at the dinner table meeting new travelers like the Swedish doctors who joined the crew then drinks, games and the inevitable trip to the bonfire on the beach and night swim. OH! the night swim!!!! Our piece of the ocean was so undisturbed that every night we went to the ocean and watched as our arms and legs were coated with the brilliant luminescent light of tiny organisms in the water. Mix that with a night sky full of stars and clouds and you truly are in paradise. My friends and I didnt want to leave and I only made one trip back to Nha Trang to get a massage and more money from the ATM. It was one of the best two planned, but four nights stayed I had ever head and I am stoked to be travelling with one of my Swedish doctor friends in Lao in a week. Memories from those wild nights and silly days were awesome, awesome, awesome and the stories would take up too much of this web page to relay... So I road away, changed and more relaxed than when I came in, from my Jungle Beach leaving a little sadness in my bungalow home. Jungle Beach won't be this way forever, as the evil spectre of development is slowly creeping in with the contruction of a road around the coastline and a new, but vacant ritzy beach resort just a few hundred meters away from JB. For now and in my dreams forever, I will have this place - like that place I loved in Hawaii at the end of the Kaulalau Trail, when ever I need it in my mind. I raced back in the rain to Nha Trang, ate some chips and green tea, met Ricky who wondered where the hell I was, packed up and ran after the bus to Hoi An we were late for. An impressive display of a sprint (that I secretly wish I didn't perform, as I wanted to go back to Jungle Beach) saved us from another day in paradise (ricky made some great friends in his diving expeditions over the previous days while I was at JB). We boarded the bus with little boy sad faces and laid down with the assistance of prescription sleeping pills and arrived very shaken in Hoi An this morning. We will play shop til' you drop in this tailors' paradise and get some new digs to ship back then head to Ha Noi. The adventures will continue, but damn, Jungle Beach is going to be hard to top. I can't update pictures at this computer, but your imagination should try to get a little work out... hope my words can relay... HappyinHoiAn, Taylor