HO CHI MINH CITY, Vietnam -- A look of panic overcame the hotel concierge when I confessed I had never driven a motorbike. Yet, here he was scurrying to arrange a rental.
He offered a driver. I declined.
I preferred to ride solo. I don't like being tethered to guides, I explained.
He glowered, turned to a bellhop and barked out in Vietnamese before his eyes again darted in my direction.
The deal was off, said Dao Cong Lap, the concierge at the Giant Dragon Hotel, which provided us comfy and inexpensive accommodations in the city's bustling tourist district.
"Too dangerous," he admonished. "You get hurt. Maybe you die."
My eyes followed a stern finger pointing to a blur of taxis and motorbikes. Just beyond, a line of pedestrians stood at the ready, mustering courage before hurling life and limbs into the current of motorized obstacles.
Not a good time to tell him of the excursion we planned that would take us 50 miles south of Ho Chi Minh City to the villages of the Mekong Delta, beyond My Tho, where a boat would ferry us to the floating markets.
We wanted a glimpse of Vietnam few travelers ever get.
Just before he relented, he struck a final blow: Was I too stupid to realize the danger?
That said, he arranged the rental for me and my traveling companions: Bee photographer Kevin German and childhood friend David Sone. They had joined me on one of my fly-by-the-seat-of-the-pants vacations.
Or, in this case, fly-by-the-seat-of-a-motorbike.
The roads of Vietnam aren't for the squeamish. Why a chicken would ever cross a road in this country -- particularly in this fast- moving city, Vietnam's largest -- is difficult to fathom. It takes courage and faith to get to the other side, even within the seeming safety of a crosswalk.
But this far from home, I was not about to let fear disrupt my mission to stray as far from the beaten path as I could -- even if it meant skidding off the pavement to get there.
The U.S. State Department warns Americans about the hazards on its Web site: "Traffic in Vietnam is chaotic. Traffic accidents, mostly involving motorcycles and often resulting in traumatic head injury, are an increasingly serious hazard. At least 30 people die each day from transportation-related injuries."
We got some advice from Don Lair, 69, an American who faced far more harrowing experiences during two tours of duty in the Vietnam War as an Army officer.
"The first couple of days, you just try to get used to the traffic," he said. "You just go and try to dodge everything moving around you."
According to one count in 2002, there were more than 11 million motorbikes to dodge in Vietnam. It is the preferred mode of transportation for the country's youths and for families who cannot afford cars -- which means most Vietnamese.
We felt ready for the challenge. This two-week trip to Southeast Asia in November already had taken us to the Philippines, where we toured my family's hometown by motorcycle, ascending from the white-sand beaches to mountain forests, our freewheeling spirits rising with the elevation and our hats flapping in the motor-driven breeze.
We wanted a similar experience in Vietnam, where we hoped to explore the Mekong Delta, Ho Chi Minh City and the resort town of Hoi An. At $8 a day, renting a motorbike was a bargain. (It was even cheaper in Hoi An, a later stop in our week in Vietnam).
Motorbikes or not, there is a lot of ground to cover. Ho Chi Minh City -- its central core still widely referred to by locals as "Saigon" -- is a sprawling metropolis, a collection of districts encompassing more than 800 square miles. District 1 is the hub of the tourist area, a grid of inexpensive hotels, shops, restaurants, bars and Internet cafes.
We'd chosen the Giant Dragon Hotel while visiting an Internet cafe in Manila -- and we may have missed out on other opportunities. Barely out of our taxi from the airport, a 20-minute ride, we found ourselves swarmed by bellhops from competing hotels along Pham Ngu Lao, a busy boulevard that is a haven for budget travelers.
The Bee's Bobby Caina Calvan can be reached at bcalvan@sacbee.com or (916) 321-1067.
