our days back in 'nam.

How we made it to this happy point, giddily frolicking by the South China Sea, was one of those travel days that really made us wish we weren't the hoi polloi and could travel by jet instead of with the riff-raff.

By the numbers:

Three (3): botched cab rides in which one of the parties left angry and/or shafted

Fourteen (14): hours on a bus getting from Phnom Penh to Saigon to Mui Ne, listening to terrible Vietnamese pop (which has replaced Bolivian pop in my mind as officially the worst music ever created)

One (1): French gentleman with overwhelming body odor on our bus

Hundreds (100s): minutes wasted at the Vietnam border, perhaps the world's most inefficient system EVER created for entering a Socialist Republic

Three (3): hostels attempted before landing in paradise

What up, Vietnam. Let's party. Also, I'm aware that I resemble Lieutenant Dan in this photo, but let me remind you what an adept swimmer he was, so it's not at all dangerous to jump in a pool in such a condition.