Dalama Adventures Tale of two corporate types ditching their jobs and traveling the world for 14 months... check out all photos, blogs & interesting tid bits at http://www.dalama.net

Our travels take us on board a motorbike that Darrin has hired for half day and we carefully make our way to the beach of Cu Dai, where we kick it under umbrellas in beach chairs sipping down beers and fruit smoothies.  The beach extends all the way north to a city called Danang.  We explore the 30K coastline, it's like a deserted Mexican beach in Baja.  Attempts at beach resort construction mysteriously stopped part way through.  Dusty, sandy streets are lined with small mom-n-pop food and drink shops, giving way to desolate, underdeveloped beach front property.  Something different here; each mom-n-pop shop has also turned into a petrol station consisting of large plastic flasks that pump a liter at a time, based on your order, filling up your moto-tank with speed and ease.  You can't really be sure of the purity or contents of the petrol, but we readily fill up, just like all the other locals, into the tanks of their cheap Chinese imported bikes.

We plant ourselves at China Beach, apparently near the site where the American Forces first arrived ashore in Vietnam.  We hire two beach chairs and an umbrella for the day, and plant ourselves pounding liters of water to keep us hydrated in the intense heat.  The ocean here is clear blue, and really warm, and is a much higher salt content than we're used to in San Diego... it keeps us floating effortlessly.  A pack of locals arrive on a bus and flood the water, all funning in fully clothed in their jeans, jackets and hats.  Darrin dares me to go wein right out there in the middle of the pack.  The thought crosses my minn, but I'm dressed in a bikini and they're all in their street clothes, so I don't want to offend anyone.  I head south of the pack to enjoy a quiet swim by myself.  The water has warmed up to near air temperature, and it's no longer a cool treat.  I float on my back, enjoying the super-salty buoyancy factor.  I must have been floating for maybe 5 minutes and I look up to see the pack of locals now around me.  I must have drifted with the current.  i look around, and all I see are bobbing heads and waving hands pointing toward me.  I drift in as the elder men out the furthest in the water wave me over.  We exchange formalities in the few common English words they know.  They reach back to shuffle their children up to practice their English with me.  Before I realize it, we're all just waist deep in water.  I'm feeling, all of a sudden, self-conscious and naked, surrounded by all these locals in their street clothes.  It's like meeting them all on the street, they're clothed, I'm not.  I sink down to talk and play with the children at their level, submerging more of my body.  Finally, their bus driver calls them all back into shore and they all take turns shaking my hand and saying goodbye.  I hang out in the water until it's safe to come back in without offending anyone dressed in full clothing.  It's like that song, itsy bitsy teeny weenie yellow polka dot bikini.... so in the water, she wanted to stay...