I know I said I'd be back the next day but then I got tired and lazy and haven't felt like turning on the lappy. Then I got myself a little (actually, not so little) cut on my thumb and that has made doing regular things really tiresome and I've been just coming home and getting into bed with my audiobook.
But here I am, and here are more pics!
The Vung Tau Parish Church is the oldest Catholic Church in Vung Tau. When we visited they were renovating the interior of the church so we couldn't look around inside.
Since the weather was holding up, and since we were already "modestly" dressed from our morning climb on sacred ground, I suggested we do all the church visitations that day so that we wouldn't have to worry about our outfits the following morning. We took a car to the Our Lady of Bai Dau Shrine on Big Mountain (farther north). (The Jesus Christ statue is on Small Mountain in the south).
Statue of Our Lady: Features a towering 32-meter (104 ft) white statue of the Virgin Mary holding the infant Jesus, completed and inaugurated on December 31, 1994.
(Walking Paths: Features the 14 Stations of the Cross, a Rosary Way with 20 mystery sculptures, and steep stairs leading up the mountain slopes with panoramic views of the sea - we did NOT attempt this walk.)
The Sailing-Ship Church: The main shrine church, shaped like a sailing ship measuring 46 by 26 meters with a capacity of 1,000 faithful, was completed in July 1995. I did walk up the steps to get to the church to drop our donations into the box but there was Mass going on so I didn't dawdle.
After visiting the Bai Dau Shrine we headed for lunch at Luca Pizza & Italian Restaurant . It was recommended as a "as good as 4Ps if not better" pizza place. But I think we both agree that 4Ps is still our preferred pizza restaurant in Vietnam.
We had a chacuterie board and a 4 cheese pizza. It wasn't bad at all, to be fair.
After lunch we went back to the hotel to get clean again. Then we decided to escape the heat by wandering inside The Robert Taylor Museum Of Worldwide Arms. BIKSS enjoyed this stop quite a fair bit, while I was in awe of the sheer volume of stuff this Robert dude managed to amass.
We went straight to dinner at Gành Hào Seafood Restaurant which was supposed to be the place to go for breathtaking sunset views. Alas the pissing rain and cloudy skies prevented us from seeing anything.
The food was pretty good tho. We had crab soup, crab spring rolls, and baby lobsters done two ways!
After dinner we walked along the pier and enjoyed the cool - almost COLD - sea breeze. I was glad to have a shawl with me. I wouldn't have guessed it could get that cold.
Since dinner was done and dusted by 730 we decided to spend the rest of the evening getting snacks and food souvenirs from the supermarket. I always love spending time at the local supermart. Vung Tau did not disappoint. There were dried / fried / preserved fish and baby crabs and squid, chips, soup bases, snacky rice cracker things and a whole lot of other interesting things like salmon floss and salted egg yolk chilli paste!
And that was the end of day 2. But now I've hit my thumb on the keyboard and it's hurting. I'm going to stop for now and come back with more when I have the energy!
