Dai Ninh Pass

The driver arrived early, but we were already up and ready to go!

Dominik and I had reached out to a tour company and had hired a private car and driver for our adventure from Saigon to Hanoi. Alex, our English-speaking driver, would prove to be fantastic! He was always punctual, very friendly and knowledgeable, and a very safe driver on Vietnam's sometimes chaotic roads.

Alex met us around 6:45am, and we were soon checking out of the Sheraton and on the road out of Saigon. Soon, skyscrapers gave way to rice fields, and after about an hour, we stopped at a rest area for breakfast.

We decided to have pho for breakfast. Vietnam's most famous dish is fragrant noodle soup made with a rich, slow-simmered bone broth, rice noodles, fresh herbs, and thin slices of tender beef. Vietnamese food is so amazingly delicious that even this "truck stop" pho was incredible.

As we drove on, we climbed up higher and higher into the mountains on winding roads. Alex shut off the AC and opened the windows, and we were surprised by how cool and dry the air was here; it had been hot and muggy back in Saigon.

We had come to Dai Ninh Pass, one of southern Vietnam's most scenic mountain roads, linking the coastal province of Bình Thuận with the Central Highlands in Lâm Đồng Province. It serves as a gateway between the lowlands and the cool, pine-covered plateau around Da Lat, destination for the day.

The pass climbs through the final ridges of the Annamite Mountains, with a series of sweeping curves and dramatic elevation changes. As we ascended, the landscape transformed from tropical forests and farmland to cooler highland forests, occasionally shrouded in mist.

It was one of the most beautiful natural landscapes that I had ever seen.

Dominik and I, two pretty "fly by the seat of our pants" kind of dudes when it comes to travel, had set off on our journey without much of a plan except for "get to Hanoi by next Tuesday", but as we stood up on an overlook staring across a sweeping vista of rolling hills, rivers, lakes, reservoirs, and dense tropical forests, I was very glad that we were driving. Going at our own pace by car would give us a view of Vietnam that we wouldn't get had we traveled by plane or even by train.