Dalat is the honey moon town of Vietnam. The climate is cooler, more temperate, the prices all a little higher, and the activities very entertaining. We started with a "cultural" tour of the surrounding area. Our friendly guide Trung, a student of tourism at the local university, took us to a long list of sites, including; a flower nursery, coffee plantation, rice-wine making business, silk factory, mushroom business, waterfall and budhist temple. It's worth noting that Dalat is one of the coffee capitals of the world. Every hillside has coffee plants. And everyone drinks coffee. It is served black or with condensed milk, iced or hot... and that's about the extent of your choices. Having never seen raw coffee beans, it was somewhat surprising to find that they are green and red!
The silk factory was also humbling in that I am completely ignorant of the silk making process. Of particular interest was the fact that the worms are actually eaten after the silk has been removed from the coccoon. The raw silk feels course and strong, and requires an acid bath to soften it up.
Rice wine is the Vietnamese version of vodka, as far as I can tell. And it is frequently used in conjunction with healing hearbs to make a tonic. Considering that it's distilled, and has only a slightly lower alcohol content than most liquor, it hardly seems to qualify as a "wine".
The waterfall and happy buddha are friendly neighbors. I can't say that I have aver set eyes on a happier buddha. Since you can't reach the belly because he's HUGE, the big toe suffices for good luck.
Elephant water fall, not more than 500 yards from the happy buddha offers a close up experience for the brave - walking BEHIND the massive cataract. Of course, the moisture was too much for me to take pictures, just imagine the wind and mist nearly knocking you off your feet.
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