ĐÀ LẠT REVISITED

 16th Dec 2022

Welcome to Dalat! Upside down Ukraine colours?

There are several interesting things to see and do in and around this charming city. Most of these, such as the extraordinary 'Crazy House', the short rail journey to Trai Mat, the Datania Roller-Coaster ride, the cable car ride from Robin Hill to Truc Lam Monastery, views from the Night Market and, indeed, the gardens and other floral arrangements in all their splendour, have been covered in detail in two past blogs. I was not going to bother to repeat them. I suggest you go to my blogs, ĐÀ LẠT Parts 1 and 2, in January 2020 to view. In fact you should because, as I am about to point out, 'fings ain't wot they was' three years ago.

The first thing I did on this visit was to take a walk around the large 'artificial' Xuan Huong lake. It is a walk of about 2 miles and good exercise after my bus journey. I passed this interesting 'ark-like' construction (left). It had a sort of 'crib' display inside.

Right: This was a rehearsal for a fashion show along a pontoon on the lake. The show was due to take place the next day. It was noticeable, compared to my previous visit nearly 3 years ago, that the spectacular floral displays on floats on the lake were absent. In fact the whole ambiance was somewhat more subdued.

I stopped off at the Gardens on the north-eastern side. Again, rather lacking in custom. On my previous visit the car park was full of tourist buses (lots of Japanese) and the place was thronged with visitors. It was almost empty this time.

Right: Inside the gardens the flower displays had obviously not been tended so assiduously, the topiary 'animal sculptures' were badly in need of a trim, all the magical fountains were switched off, some of the 'arty' displays looked in need of renovation and there were none of the usual hard-grafting gardeners in evidence. Also the place was almost totally devoid of visitors. It was rather a depressing sight. In fact this was to be the nature of much of my following visit. Presumably this is all due to the after-effects of the blasted worldwide 'panicdemic' and although life is more or less back to normal here now, with no restrictions, it has obviously had a seriously detrimental effect on the tourist trade.

On my continued walk around the lake I noticed that the many 'swan style' pedalos were all tethered to their moorings. A few of the horses harnessed to colourfully decorated 'carriages' which used to gallop down the road from the gardens to the town in profusion (dangerously but fun) were still there, the horses dozing, as were their drivers. None seemed to be being hired. It was all a bit downbeat.

Left: The entrance to the enormous Night Market. Still popular but, again, lacking in the vibrancy of previous times and no dancing or  music which I  fondly remembered.

The weather this time was also cooler and more overcast and, on two days, surprisingly windy. I nearly lost my hat, twice.

Right: My favourite bar, The Maze, on an upper-level street north of the market. It is the most extraordinary building inside. It is on 6 floors with a roof terrace on top and a basement. It appears to be hewn out of wood, and stone blocks, with tiny dark alcoves, uneven steps up narrow winding spirals with tree roots for handrails, small irregular, dark, unmanned, bars on each floor and 'Gormanghast' gothic style spooky sculptured walls. 

Left: It is difficult to photograph to give you the idea. You have to order your drinks at the entrance and carry them up, hopefully without spilling them, to whichever level you wish. It would undoubtedly fail every 'Elf 'n Safety' regulation in the UK. I went there twice and on only one occasion was there anyone else in there (a couple of delightful English girls whom I met on the roof terrace). It used to be busy with tourists.

This town has a profusion of hotels, some very large and luxurious, and guest houses. They are wall to wall in some streets. I began to wonder how they are managing to cope with the lack of custom. Certainly the little place I was staying at did not seem to have many guests and with several empty rooms.

I booked myself onto a 'guided' tour for the next day. Unusual for me, but hoped to see a few new sights. Which I did. To be revealed next..........