*Post updated, 2020
I decided to be a granny and go on an organised day trip. It was a very reasonable price and included breakfast and lunch as well as taking me to visit the following places:
- Bao Dai’s Summer Palace
- Hang Nga Crazy House
- Dalat Cathedral
- Cremaillere
- Robin Hill
Bao Dai’s Summer Palace
This Art Deco influenced summer hideaway is set in a pine grove, 2 km South West of the city center and is quite a nice place to visit if you are a bit of a design geek (like me). It was the summer palace of a man called Bao Dai, who was the 13th and final emperor of the Nguyen Dynasty, the last in Vietnam. It was one of three palaces that he had within Dalat (a little excessive I feel), and the decor has not been changed in decades, making a visit like wandering onto a retro film set…like James Bond or Austin Powers ๐
Hang Nga Crazy House
Hang Nga guesthouse, affectionately known as the ‘Crazy House’, is a completely mad building designed by an eccentric old Vietnamese lady architect.
Some people describe it as a fairy-tale type building or like something that has come from Alice in Wonderland: there is a giant tree and huge animals which you can sort of climb into, spiders, mushrooms and even little cave-like nooks with tables built in.
Dalat Cathedral
Cremaillere
The Cremaillere is a cog railway on the ฤร LแบกtโThรกp Chร m Railway. According to Wikipedia:
The Da LatโThap Cham railway (Vietnamese: ฤฦฐแปng sแบฏt Thรกp Chร m-ฤร Lแบกt) or Da Lat-Phan Rang railway (Vietnamese: ฤฦฐแปng sแบฏt Phan Rang-ฤร Lแบกt) was an 84 km (52 mi) rack railway connecting the city of Da Lat to the main NorthโSouth railway at Thรกp Chร m in Ninh Thuแบญn Province.
(Wikipedia, 2020)
It linked the two cities from 1932 up until 1975. The railway was abandoned though, during the Vietnam/American War. It was dismantled after the North Vietnamese victory in 1975, to provide materials for the restoration of the heavily damaged North-South line.
The line has now been partially repaired and is a tourist attraction.
Robin Hill
This is a 1600 m cable car.
Waterfall
We were supposed to go to the Prenn Waterfall, but apparently there is no water in it this time of the year! Instead the tour went to Datania Falls, which were positively gushing ๐
At the waterfalls you can chose to walk down or get a random roller coaster…I walked…however once we had got to the bottom and had taken some photos, I didn’t want to walk back, so I took the roller coaster back up the hill!
One of my better ideas, I’d say.
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