Read about the trip here below; click the headline to get to the photos of that day.

Hellraising Scooter Run in The Highlands, Vietnam 2009
After last years wouderful and wicked experience of driving from Saigon to Hanoi, we just had to repeat it for this year, our first idea where to drive from Saigon into Laos and Cambodia and back but current situation would make it almost sure that our classical scooters should be confiscated at the border...so another idea where born of one more trip within Vietnam...Hellraising in the Highlands!

January 20th, Hong Kong to Saigon by flight

Anders and I take the flight from Hong Kong to Saigon at early evening and soon join the other riders for a pre meeting/beer drinking session at Saigon Scooter Centre. And yes, my new baby is here! Matt black powder coated with a PX200 engine that I previosly had smuggled in from Hong Kong and a Vietnam inspired evil air brush theme. Pat hands out a scooter run kit containing cables, tools, stickers, oil jug and a very impressing binder for the event where he have collected all the information and maps of absolutely everything we will and might need.

January 21st, Preparations in Saigon
Met up early morning at Saigon Scooter Centre for changing the cylinder and tires on my scooter and for me to kill Pat's MB240. Sorry mate. The whole afternoon is spent packing all the necessities for the trip like 13 inner tubes, beer, gear boxes, cylinders, engines, sausages, bacon and 2T oil. On the way back to the hotel I realize that my favourite route to downtown is closed and I have no idea how to drive back but drives on anyway and succeeds in getting totally lost. For some good Vietnamese Dongs a Honda driver helps us out through the extremely hectic and crazy new year traffic and to the correct direction. We meet up Hamish at X-cafe and he shows pictures of his 106HP LD that is planned to be on the road/back wheel quite soon according to himself. Paul takes us to Ben Thanh street market where his girlfriend Linh barbeques food for us on a roof tile and makes very delicious fresh spring rolls, extremely delicious that is, thank you!

January 22nd, Saigon to Dong Xoai
The event starts early with a tasty breakfast buffet at Mövenpick hotel. It takes us about an hour to zig zag out of Saigon and onto the beautiful country side. The first tens of kilometres go smoothly but suddenly Anders Vespa PX dies. With the help of a new feeding coil we sort that out in no time. Due to pouring the lubrication in the wrong hole, Matt seizes up his Vespa PX and locks the back wheel fully causing Anders to a sudden evasive manoeuvre clipping Matt's right side mirror just before Quang the mechanic crashes directly into Matt. Quang amazingly survives without any body injuries thanks to a true Jackie Chan stunt fall and roll. Quang's Vespa PX just gets a crashed front mudguard, bent fork and the handlebars knocked out of line, on Matt's PX however the rear chassis is smashed so badly that it blocks the rear wheel. Some adjustable spanners, hammers and true male power get it bended out and rideable again. Matt learns why the hard why the other riders in our group are riding with two fingers on the clutch grip ready to declutch at any time and Quang learns that some distance when hellraising is not a bad idea. The route takes us through rubber plantations where Pat spots a perfect area for our bbq lunch. Rubber three wood, a 10mm spanner and a circlip pliers cooks the British bangers crispy and tasty. While enjoying the food and drinks in the Vietnamese wilderness we notice the shocking similarity of the battle damage on Matt's PX to one of the PX's last year, also that one in an accident because of a self caused lubrication problem. In Dong Xoai, there is only one hotel where foreigners are allowed to stay, so there we stay together with hundreds of geckos. Just outside the hotel is a very loud sound system that on the evening is telling about how to achieve the joys and benefits of a good communist life.

January 23rd, Dong Xoai to Gia Nghia

The propaganda sound system starts at full volume 5 am with work out instructions and then onwards until 8am with just very bad music before it is propaganda time again.
Early rise and full throttle out of the by God forgotten town. Just after we get out of town my kick start drive seizes throwing the kick start down to the tarmac and fully blocking my dear Hong Kong engine. We occupies a small cafe with a Honda workshop where Quang open my engine and finds the root cause to be that the kick start drive have been sleeved with a too tight play and without any oil grooves. Quang grinds up a good play and I cut two groovy oil grooves and the engine is together soon after the girls finished cooking our brunch. At the next stop Paul is offered a duck for 400000VND (20€) however we find some flowers for free to suck on instead. The rest of the day is a steady climb and at 600m above sea level we arrive at an almost deserted top class resort where we turn the band stand into a barbecue and soul party place. The only other guest is a German guy recording some kind of exotic movie, nobody mind our noisiness.

January 24th, Gia Nghia to Lake Lak
My imported Hong Kong flu really hits me during the night and the local witch doctor arrives at the hotel on a old Honda looking not so sharp in his fake leather jacket and brown teeth but surprisingly he knows how to prescribe both known and unknown medicine. We continue to climb up to about 1500m while passing by the Cambodian border. Our first stop is at Buon Ma Thout for the must to take photo in front of the tank and a delicious lunch at the DIY rice paper roll restaurant we found last year. It's just before Tet (Lunar new year) and everybody are getting some new furniture for the new year and surely both king size beds and 4 seater sofas with chairs are transported on Hondas as everything else in this country. The rest of the drive goes along a very bumpy road through rice fields and at one bridge a big hole is repaired by simply pouring sand over it causing all of us to take off into the air but we all land safely enough to in no time at all catch up with Paul and his broken down back up car. Luckily his car breaks down at a very beautiful location so we had a well needed rest and got his car up and running again with the help of various scooter tools and scooter mechanics. We arrive at Lak Lake resort rather late and are puzzled about that the resort offers "Ride elephant through the lake" as we just wants to drive the car into the lake.

January 25th, Lake Lak to Dalat
Before heading up to Dalat we make a detour up to the King's old palace looking over Lak Lake. Today's drive is through an empty mountain pass that is only partly surfaced and the temperature drops as higher as we get. At a small road side cafe we find a big jar of strong alcohol containing snakes, lizards and some undefined testicles. Well I just have to try and it is the best snake wine I ever had even if my travel companions strongly doubt it. We cook our lunch at an extremely beautiful spot overlooking a rainforest valley. As well as having a tasty lunch we find out that Paul's car just runs on three cylinders and even if that is three times more than our scooters it's a quite bad thing. After driving slalom between cows, pigs and chickens the car finally gives up just after a deserted re-education camp. We decide over a beer with a small iceberg in it that our best chance is loading up our scooters with the luggage from the car and get going. The drive into Dalat at 1700m elevation is awesome passing buy old palace like French buildings. Our home and workshop for two days is a converted French villa from the 1920's. As this is new years eve most of the places are closed but we managed to enjoy a lion dance and get rabbit tasting like rat for dinner.

January 26th, Dalat, day trip
Dalat is a truly beautiful mountain city almost giving you the feeling of being in the alps and we get into a touristy mood in the cable care ride over the wine fields. Yes they make wine here, but Dalat Red is absolutely not the best wine in the world. Today, a lot of people are new year's day cruising around town in their best clothes and surprisingly many with their whole family on Vespa Sprint or in a classic car. A new year's buffet with local friends at Novotel followed by an after party at the hotel with Vodka Hanoi and Number One helped catapulting us into the year of the ox.

January 27th, Dalat to Nha Trang
Nick, a nice and crazy guy from US/Vietnam joins us for today's drive on his far too ugly Vespa. Rumours had arrived us about a new mountain pass that have been finalized and opened. It takes quite a while to find it and well, it is not really finalized yet but anyway kind of drivable. Anyhow we are almost the only riders on the mountain pass that takes us as far up as 2400m and down through the jungle with natural waterfalls and ending at sea level where we cook lunch and prepares for our re-entry in the beach and party town of Nha Trang.

January 28th, Nha Trang, daytrip rafting in Nha Trang
Bruce, a fellow scooterist organizes a day of river rafting with bbq on a riverbank. Why the beer contains formaldehyde is a mystery that I might not want to know the answer of. We have a scenic evening ride north on Highway 1 to a beautifully located seafood place outside town. Our last day here ended with Polini tuning of our brains and finding the northern soul tunes that we planted at a place here last year.

January 29th, Nha Trang to Tuy Hoa
We all tries to buy flight tickets from Danang to Saigon but we soon realizes that somebody have booked each and every ticket around Tet and selling them on the expensive black market, however the cute girl at the travel agency also knows how to deal with that, as well as sorting out black market tickets she wants to get married and we proudly introduce her to Matt. We roll out our scooters from the hotel reception, stocks up on wine and rolls away along the coast. Paul takes us to a local beach with seafood and fast food market and yes it is delicious as almost everywhere else in this country. At the next petrol station they tries their best to cheat Matt and me of our money and after some kilometres we understands that they also sold us mixed petrol, maybe with snake wine, as our scooters becomes almost undeliverable. Some good fresh fuel gets us back on the track again. The rest of the drive is on unpaved roads and there are propaganda PA-systems exactly everywhere and yes it is very annoying. When a Lambro 550 full of people passes by it get our moods back for arrival in Thy Hoa and fish hot pot dinner at a newly opened beach restaurant.

January 30th, Tuy Hoa to Kontum

Early morning start as today's drive is long. The first leg is amazing on a road running along a canal, where people are washing clothes, themselves, their cows as well as taking a leak. Further on the road becomes really bad and soon Anders gets the trip's first puncture. The further we drive the more animals there are on the road, first a black small pig runs out in front of me but misses my front wheel by just centimetres, Anders however have to make a full stop with screaming tires to avoid being owner of a dead small black pig as well as a crashed PX. Next in line is a cow that speeds down a hill and jumps down in front of Mark who also just misses it with centimetres. Busses owns the roads here and one pushes Pat of the road causes him to drive cross country a good half kilometre before he safely comes back on to the road again. We occupy another roadside cafe where we barbeque our lunch and service our scooters, why the cafe have a really ugly bird tied up to a tree on their untidy backyard beats me. Kontum is truly boring but after a couple hours we succeed in finding the only good restaurant in town and it is excellent. The day ends with all of us in a boat on dry land and a hair style competition using Paul as a model, who and why the competition started is another story.

January 31st, Kontum, day trip to Cambodian border

Paul, Linh, Mark, Quang and I have an early morning and we decide to drive east towards Cambodia. We have a really nice drive through deserted roads into the closed border area and take a detour meeting a local ethnic tribe living in very peculiar looking houses and speaking a language we don't understand a word of. Further on when the signs starts to have Sanskrit on them we understands it might be a very good idea to turn back before anybody find out that we are here, we do get lost on the dirt tracks not knowing what side of the border we are at and stops at a lonely house to get instructions and oh yes my heart beat doubles when we find out that all persons in the house are high ranking militaries celebrating new year, luckily very heavily and they just smiles and tells us on unstable legs the way to get back without even shooting one of us. 140 km later we are back at the hotel and meet up the other guys who just woke up and we cook a lunch for us and a brunch for them. As this boring town only seems to have one good restaurant we go there again for an excellent dinner. The best thing with a group of crazy scooterists like this is at even the most boring place you could have a great time.

February 1st, Kontum to Kham Duc
Kick started at 8am and heading north along coffee plantations while watching out for water buffaloes and tour busses. We stop for a drink at a very dodgy place and did notice that they re-fills Vodka Hanoi bottles with moonshine here. They also sell Champagne made in Saigon for 30000 VND (€1,5), but is really champagne dark red and smells of sugar cane and rice wine? For fun we get two bottles to try. A steady climb along Cambodian border takes us up to 2100m and through villages and roads that haven't changed much the last hundreds of years. Today's drive is a real long one but we anyway arrives early at Kham Duc and have a beer cheering for the new year with the locals at a grass weighting station that doubles as a bring your own bottle moonshine fill up station. Staying at a ethnic minority resort is nice but when the champagne is fake and truly undrinkable Matt, Anders and I decide to take our Vespas out for a spin in to the wilderness. Matt and I gets stuck in a swamp but with jointed efforts while overlooked buy the local gang on Minsks we are back on solid land and heads for the jungle where we discovers very old and interesting villages and an ancient road most probably leading into Laos. The day ends with Paul eating a duck embryo at the local bar where we meet a guy who is out refilling his moonshine bottle. You could surely notice that the moonshine is doing its trick on him but we don't really believe him when he tells us his name is Beckham as he actually looks more like Brad Pitt.

February 2nd, Kham Duc to Hoi An
Waking up by the aggressive one cylinder two stroke sound of hard working Minsks outside the resorts is rather nice and it get us ready in no time for this trips last leg. It's just 5km on the highway before we turn eastwards on an almost finalized road through villages where kids walks and bicycle to first day at school after new year and villagers walks their cows and buffaloes just as they are dogs. This new road is as dusty as it is beautiful. Soon after a graveyard two Hondas at full throttle comes up in front of me from a side road and have me breaking hard to avoid a three vehicle crash. Continuing a kilometre a bloody car pushes me out for some exciting motor cross riding that ended luckily back on the road just before I would have crashed into a ditch. We stop at a crossroad asking some local guys for the way while they are putting pigs in baskets and loading them up on their motorbikes, they want money for the direction information but our trusted map got us on the right road for free. The remaining ride goes along the scary highway number one where you always have too look out for speeding busses overtaking, sometimes three in parallel. We arrive safely in the old city of Ho An at early afternoon giving the possibility to have not less than two meals at miss Ly's place where Pat hands out prices for the most reliable scooter to Mark Brooks with his Silver Special and a double sided price to Anders for most crashes as well as furthest travelled. Now it's just to load the dirty end dented Vespas and shiny Lambrettas on a truck and take flights back to the reality and then back up onto the treadmill.

Thanks:
To Pat who organized this amazing event
To Paul who drove the rescue car(s)
To Quang who serviced and fixed our scoots all the way.
To all nice and friendly people we met on the way.

Summary and facts:
Spare parts used: 2x M8 washer, 1x spare wheel, 3x sparkplugs, 1x feeding coil and 1x carburettor gasket.
The driven distance was 1576km (according to Mark's sexy Smiths speedo)
The myth that a Vespa is more reliable than a Lambretta is busted.
Beer, good food and hellraising left the traces on our (not so) well trained body's, everyone put on minimum the same weight as a Vespa PX cylinder.
Vespa is not a suitable vehicle to drive in a swamp.
Always fill up petrol from the same pumps as the locals.

The team:
Drivers:
Pat Joynt – Lambretta series 2 200cc
Calle Krokstäde – Vespa Vbc/Sprint 200cc
Anders Poulsen – Vespa PX150E
Matthew Sparrow – Vespa PX150E
Paul Schaefer – Back up car
Mark Brooks – Lambretta Silver Special Mugello 186
Quang the mechanic – Vespa PX150E

Hangarounds and chefs:
Linh and Linh

Pictures and text copyrighted to soulscooter.com

/Calle