Touring Phú Quốc, Vietnam, by motorbike!

Posted 3 August 2024 at 00:00 at age 36.
Edited 25 September 2024 at 18:05.

Having spent 10 days in Japan, Patton and I left Osaka and embarked on our Vietnam adventure. I last entered the country 10 years ago. I loved my time there and was excited to see more cities there, and to hear my friend Patton speak Vietnamese! Our first stop was in the southern island of Phú Quốc. We spent three nights there.

Patton wanted to go to Vietnam in part to visit friends and former colleagues in several cities. Two of those friends were Ryan and Mario, who run a cute little resort called Bauhinia on Phu Quoc island. We thus arranged to stay there for our three nights in Vietnam while we explored the island. We did some investigating of things to do before going on the trip, but in the end we pretty much took suggestions from folks and did things spontaneously. It was a lot of fun, especially since I got to drive a motorbike again!

Wednesday, July 31

We left Osaka around 09:20 by a VietJet Air flight to Hanoi, where we transferred to a domestic flight to Phu Quoc. That all went pretty smoothly despite my fears about the carry on bags being overweight. Patton and I added a checked bag to each of our tickets since it was pretty cheap and we would probably need it. I paid to increase my carry on from 7kg to 9kg as well. At the ticket counter, they did weigh my carry on, which came out to 8.5kg. She told me it was overweight, and I told her I paid for the increase. She didn’t seem to understand what I said, but then made it seem like she was making an exception and allowing it. Oh well, whatever. I packed some of my clothes into Patton’s extra little IBM duffel he brought for this purpose.

When we landed at Hanoi’s Noi Bai airport, we were in the international terminal and needed to get to the domestic. I assumed we could walk, but it turned out the terminal was something like 1kg away and we needed to take a shuttle. While looking for that, we asked a city bus driver for a pointer. Well, Patton asked, in Vietnamese. I’m not sure exactly what they all said, but the guy ended up telling us to get on. There was no one else on the bus, and he was apparently about to head to the city center. We were not confident he understood where we wanted to go, but I was put at ease when I checked Google Maps on my phone and saw he was making the turn to go down toward the domestic terminal. Phew! We didn’t even pay, which was nice. Thanks driver!

After landing at Hanoi, Vietnam, on VietJet Air flight VJ939 from Osaka, Japan. Flight time 5h00m, 09:20 to 12:20.

We took a strange bus after asking the driver for a pointer to the shuttle to the other terminal. I think it was a city bus but he drove us anyway. Very nice.

Then we had a quick lunch at another one of Patton’s lounges, and apparently I had two beers. Then it was off to board via bus transfer to our flight to Phu Quoc.

During that flight I sat in the middle with a Vietnamese lady next to me at the window. It was interesting that she kept making phone calls all through boarding till after we were airborne. I counted at least five separate calls she made, where she kept talking loudly even during the flight attendants’ safety demonstration. The staff were a few feet away and didn’t seem to mind. I also noticed she kept putting her bare feet in my space and on my arm rest and food tray. Heh.

We landed there without issue and went to see if the ride we didn’t get confirmation about materialized. Thankfully we quickly found a nice man holding a sign reading “Mr. Patton”. Patton got a kick out of that, and he asked to take a picture with the sign.

Getting in our ride from Phu Quoc International Airport to Bauhinia Resort & Spa Phu Quoc.

It was about a 15 minute drive to the hotel. We checked in around 17:45 and then unpacked and washed up a bit. We headed out an hour later to find an ATM and explore the nearby commercial street, Đường Trần Hưng Đạo. I decided to bring my Nikon Z7ii camera even though I didn’t have a great way to conceal it. I was a little nervous, still adjusting to a new area.

This is where our hotel's small street meets the larger road, Đường Trần Hưng Đạo, or Tran Hung Dao Street, in Phú Quốc.

Patton was carrying a gift from Japan we were going to give to Mario and Ryan later, but he managed to leave it at the ATM. Thankfully he remembered and fetched it!

Exploring on foot Đường Trần Hưng Đạo, or Tran Hung Dao Street, in Phú Quốc.

We then made our way to the night market, Chợ đêm Phú Quốc. It was pretty crowded but we were able to move around and look at things just fine. Patton spent some time investigating the prices of pearl necklaces so he could help some people in his family buy some.