25th May - Qui Nhon

Woke up fairly early as the bike was due an oil change, they recommend every 1000km here and it's done ~900. Asked the staff at the hostel if they knew a good place and they said they could arrange for a mechanic to come over to the hostel later and do it there, all for the princely sum of $4. I agreed and we arranged for him to pop over at 6pm.

Headed out of town on the bike and took a few random turns along the coast until I came to a stange looking building by the sea that offered entry tickets at 5000VND (about $0.25). Curiousity got the better of me and I bought a ticket and drove in.

Turns out I'd found a leprosy hospital with a private beach that was open to the public. They also offered tours of the hospital but there wasn't one running today. I wandered around the grounds for a while where there was a "celebrity statue garden" with busts of famous philosophers and people of a medical background.

It seems that the people that come for leprosy treatment live in chalets amongst the grounds with their families. I bought a beer and some mangoes from someone who I assume was a patient there and went to sit on a bench looking out sea and read my book for a while.

I headed back into town and had a wander along the beach front for a while before the skies darkened and it started to rain quite heavily. Decided to head back to the hostel to wait it out and ended up watching Rambo. It was still raining so I had something to eat before watching Rambo II and falling asleep. Not a bad thing as I need to be up early for tomorrow's mammoth journey.