Dalat's the way uh-huh uh-huh I like it

I didn't sleep well in Dalat. I don't know if it was the hum of the fan, needed in lieu of air-con, or the bed-sheets being around seven-eighths the length of the bed therefore only six-eighths the length of my body, or the fact that the rest of the hotel was seemingly occupied by a single family perpetually walking between each other's open doors and engaging in a group activity similar to how we might get out the Monopoly board only the aim of this game was to shout loudly in the hallway with the winner being declared, equally loudly, the one who can piss-off the westerners upstairs the most. The game is called 'Let's be a Family of Selfish Pricks' and is being localised by Hasbro for the UK market with a more suburban theme under the working title 'Scallys in the Alley'.

However it didn't take long for my mood to improve. Our hotel, 'Lavender Tim Bed & Breakfasts' didn't serve breakfast so on the way to our first sight we stopped off at a bakery. Woody had a meat sandwich, Mark went for a bun shaped like a cat and I picked-out a fat piece of sweet bread and what appeared to be an unexciting sort-of squashed croissant thing. The sweet bread was delicious, but then I bit into the croissant-thing and discovered a vein of chocolate, à la pain au chocolate, and was overjoyed. It was the most intense mood-swing instigated by a pastry in my entire life.

Our first proper/planned stop of the day was the Crazy House. This is, ostensibly, a house that could only have been designed by somebody with wild imagination, intense perseverance and the resources and governmental connections that come with being the daughter of the former leader of the Vietnam Communist Party. With its sculpted cave-like corridors, fantasy-inspired detailing and twisting, tree-like walkways it felt like a Tim Burton fever-dream at Disneyworld. It also isn't actually a house, but a hotel, though with prices three times what we're paying for the peace and privacy of a zoo enclosure, we decided just to pay a brief visit.

Next we walked the width of the city toward Da Lat railway station. We stopped briefly to take pictures of something that looked like a massive bagel, then went into the building beneath it and found it to be a shopping mall. We wandered it briefly, with Woody and I being captured on camera in our first co-starring roles as 'westerners stood behind actress getting fake-mugged, not offering assistance or giving chase to culprit'. I heard Matt Damon and Ben Affleck got their big break in much the same way.

We eventually arrived at the station, an old but restored Art Deco style building, to find to our surprise that there were trains running. The line formerly served by the station had been decommissioned during the Vietnam war, but a short section was now open as a novelty tourist route. There weren't many trains a day and they didn't sync with our schedule, so we took some pictures and moved on.

Following a maze-like trek through the narrow, winding backstreets of a nearby suburb we arrived at Lam Dong museum. There were exhibits on the local culture and history, ancient and moderately-recent artefacts and some disturbing taxidermy, most memorable of which were the wild-cats that looked far more threatening in their deceased/stuffed state than I'm sure they ever did when they could follow-up that threat with a sharp-clawed mauling.

A short walk from the museum was the King's Palace, the former residence of Vietnam's last emporer. Within stunningly kept grounds were several modest-sized-for-a-king but still-bloody-massive houses. Since leaving the mall and here, whatever show Woody and I appeared in must have aired as we were mobbed by a flashmob of fans all wanting pictures taken with this mysterious new talent.

In every city we've been to in Vietnam we have been invited to pose for photographs with local or travelling Vietnamese. As white westerners we are a novelty here and there appears to be some caché attached to having one's picture taken with such exotic visitors to their country. We eagerly partake, our novelty being something of a novelty to us also, and will of course be encouraging the uptake of this custom back home. I implore all, should you come across somebody with a different colour skin to you, maybe they believe in a different faith or perhaps just possess a physical deformity, do be sure to snap them in a selfie. It would be discriminatory not to.

The clock struck Cornetto'clock so we had our daily packaged cone ice-cream then jumped in a taxi to take us back to the opposite side of town to the cable-car station for transport to Truc Lam pagoda. The cable-car crossed some standard gorgeous landscape and the pagoda was equally, standardly impressive. We had lunch at a cafe and had disagreements over the mechanics of the Nightmare Before Christmas Extended Universe, but agreed the soundtrack is catchy. There was a cool water feature; a water jet supporting a huge stone ball that was spinning erratically under the pressure; like a fountain with something blocking the pipe, but intentionally so.

With time to spare we whizzed back across town and got back to the station again for the final scheduled train of the day. There were four class tiers to choose from, all cheap, so we opted for the VIP2 class, so as to not come across as the ostentatious, stuck-up toffs that went for the 50p more expensive VIP1.

The journey was nice, the carriages authentically old-looking and Mark got some good pictures precariously leaning out the window with his camera. It was our understanding that this brief, scenic trip to a small nearby town was the attraction and upon arrival in the bustling, slightly dingy-looking Trai Mat we considered our understanding . With half an hour till the return train we decided to wander into town on the off-chance we might find a Dalat specialty we'd seen some street-sellers peddling, Pizza Dalat.

Expecting to fail and keeping check of our valuables we walked down the street then turned an unassuming corner and found something spectacular. We were all like:

What's this? What's this?
There's colour everywhere.
What's this?
There's incense in the air.
What's this?
There's temples, pagodas, statues, stalls and people selling bric-a-brac and knicks and knacks and Pizza Dalat to share...
What's this!?

Well, I was anyway.

We'd stumbled upon a very pretty district with some of the most striking temples, pagodas and statues we've yet seen. They were far from the most ancient, fairly modern relatively speaking but, despite what the correct minority of Doctor Who Smith/Capaldi debaters might argue, older isn't always better. They also had the largest Buddha statue in the world constructed from flowers, guinness world record, which if that doesn't impress you nothing will. Dalat Pizza was a very poor-man's pizza; heated rice paper topped with spring onions and an egg cooked on top then wrapped-up like a crepe. Dominoes won't lose any sleep over this challenger-product.

By evening we were tired so went for a proper normal pizza, with dough and tomato and cheese and everything, at the 24H place over the street. We had originally planned to go there for breakfast, but it had been closed.Read more