Kayaking gone bad in Viet Nam

I was motorbiking across Viet Nam with some friends. We got to our hostel fairly early on in the day. Nice place with a bar and hammocks overlooking the sea. It was called, Life's a Beach. I sure found the name ironic with what was to come. I grabbed a pint as soon as I sat down and put my feet up.

A 'pint' to get things going

There were two hours remaining until sundown and the hostel also happened to rent kayaks. A few small islands were dotted just nearby and they suggested a roundtrip lasts two-three hours which people often do. We will be making a move early next morning, so it was either now or never if I wanted to do some kayaking. Let's do it! They only had double kayaks so I did ask my friends to join and really tried to convince them, but nobody was keen because they were all tired from being on the bike for hours. What a cop out. I downed my second pint and took off into the waves.

View from the hostel to the two islands

I knew I was short on time so I was powering away, feeling like an Olympian in his element. It took about half an hour to get to the first island around a mile away. I had my trusty Garmin on my wrist to tell me how far I'm going. I barely had any breaks and just pushed through. I wanted to get to the second bigger island behind the first one, not really knowing how far it lies. It looked close enough. After covering around half of the way between the two islands I realised the island was still quite far and there won't be much sunlight left. I kept going because I might see some awesome red sky and what better place for a view than out on the sea. Eventually I knew it would get dark before I will reach the second island, but this entire time I had been coming out against the current, so it would take me like half the time to get back and I knew I'd smash that part out no problem. I did take a small bottle of water with me for the journey so I had some hydration going on at least. I had been keeping an eye on where along the coast the hostel roughly is, as it might be difficult to distinguish even in the daytime, let alone in darkness. The huge mountain contours provided a nice reference point for where to roughly aim towards.

Somewhere between the two islands facing the mountainous coast

Closing in on the second island. Not an amazing sunset but still a bit of red

The Sun went down and it didn't take too much longer to reach the island. It was quite dark by then though. Covered a little over 3 miles in just over one hour and a half. Took a quick breather, sipped my water and watched loads of crabs scuttling on the rock faces. There were so many and you could hear them all. The coast was all vertical rocks of a metre or two height. No beach in this part. Anyway, it was time to head back. I was making great progress flying along with the current and watching a thunderstorm flash across the sky in the far distance. So I've barely done any kayaking in my life but it's fairly easy. Mile and a half down in no time, but suddenly there was an issue. I had been in the water for about two hours now and there seemed to be quite a bit of water on the open double person kayak I was in. I only noticed because keeping balance was suddenly getting much harder and with the small waves hitting the side of the kayak, at times it was too wobbly for comfort. I used the oar to throw out quite a bit of water but it didn't make much of a difference. I carried on going and very soon the inevitable reality hit. This thing is going to topple. In two minutes, in ten minutes, whenever. Doesn't matter, it will happen. I can keep fighting it, but my efforts are futile and I'm not moving too fast anymore as I'm so low in the water. I'm still about 1.5 miles away from the hostel at this point and I won't make that distance. I decided to topple it myself because I was wasting a lot of energy balancing the damn thing and my hope was that a quick jump in and jump back on will rid more of the water from the top. Did that twice but the water didn't go anywhere. It became clear that the water is inside the kayak chassis. Must have been slowly leaking through and getting worse as I went on. I don't have enough knowledge on kayaks but this was a big issue now. It can't be ridden. So I left it upside down and lead on it having a think. The waves weren't big but they were enough to make it a bit difficult to lie on the kayak. I had to hold on to not get pushed off and definitely couldn't just chill out. I had my phone with me in a waterproof pouch. It had been playing music throughout the ride and the battery was almost dead. I took it out and tried to message my mates that I need some help. My hands were wet though and the touch screen wasn't playing along. It soon died. I decided to see whether using my legs to kick would move the kayak anywhere, but it didn't seem to move much at all. I was fairly sure the current will wash us up on this long beach that carries on for at least ten miles to the South of the hostel. But when would that be? Two hours? Five hours? Occasionally a boat would pass nearby and I was waving the white oar around as high as I could, but nobody took notice. My only other option was to ditch the kayak and swim back. This situation happened back in 2017 and to this date remains the biggest decision I've ever had to make. I really didn't want to swim because we were in the open sea and my main worry was - are there any sharks? It's a long swim back, around 1.5 miles. I know I can do it. I used to do some triathlons and have swam a bit before, but this swim will take me like an hour and without having done any swimming in ages, it's going to hurt. I was obviously a tad exhausted, hadn't eaten in five hours and only had the little bit of water earlier on. Either way, it felt a million times safer floating on that piece of plastic than having nothing beneath me. I really didn't want to leave. It felt so much safer here and it was just easier to float not putting any effort in. I don’t need to do anything. Just lie about for some hours. The water was fairly warm as well. But no, I couldn’t just sit here doing nothing for an unknown amount of time, so I went for it. Ditched the kayak and there was no turning back now. My god this swim sucked. I could see the dark outlines of the huge mountains and a curve in the road being lit up by car headlights. That's close to where I need to aim for. This swim, this whole swim I was thinking - man I'm going to die. I've really done it now. A shark is going to rip me apart. There is nothing I can do, it will hurt so much. You idiot. But that wasn't gonna get me out, all I could do was keep swimming. Maybe another 45 minutes of this shit to go. I won't be safe until I am on dry land again. Until then I just need to hold my emotions and keep swimming even though I'm shit scared. I was actually making good progress according to my Garmin. I had done almost a kilometre when I noticed what sounded like a boat with bright lights not too far to my side. It didn't seem to be moving at all though so I wasn't sure if it's something else. Maybe like a giant buoy, but why this engine noise? Thought I'd take a quick look, nothing to lose. Got closer and yeah, it's a fisherman's boat. I yelled out but no response. Seemed like some ghost ship floating with the engine roaring. Shouted out again and this Vietnamese fisherman popped his head up. I did wonder what was going through his mind and if he ever thinks about me. Some white guy in an orange life vest coming out of the sea. What the hell? He helped me up onto the boat. I was so thirsty as I hadn't drunk anything since I first toppled the kayak. He gave me water, cooked me some noodles and gave me a shirt to wear to keep warm. Sadly big language barrier there so I wasn't able to figure out where he was going or when I could get back to land again. He had some weird looking phone and called someone who just about spoke some English. Very difficult to converse but it sounded like I will be getting to land when the Sun comes up. It was 8pm right now, that's a long wait. But where exactly - no idea. Could be anywhere and I wouldn't know where to go from there. I also tried to ask about sharks in the water but they couldn't understand what I was saying. They just said that the water is dangerous. Currents, sharks, something else? No idea but apparently dangerous. I just sat down again defeated. This boat was moving, but moving extremely slowly. After a while I figured I can't just stay there and not get in touch with my mates. They must be worried sick. So I was gonna jump back in and keep on swimming. Moments before it had been the scariest thing to be in the water, but I simply couldn't leave my friends worrying like this. The safety of the boat made me probably forget how terrifying it had felt before. But I had been fine right? Even though looking over the edge of the boat at the floodlights in the water, there were these foot long see-through worms slithering around. Eugh, what else lurks in there? But the fisherman called someone else when I took the shirt off and started gesturing to him about wanting to go swim to the coast. So he called some other person whose English was maybe slightly better. Still couldn't confirm my shark fears but same info again of getting to land about 6am and this time round they said it was very dangerous in the water because of the currents, so I finally thought I better stay put. It would be so stupid to go die now that I am actually safe. I tried mentioning the name of the hostel also, but nothing came of that. Nothing I can do. It sucks I can't tell my friends and everyone is in for a rough night. At night I watched the fisherman go about his business, going out in the little teacup boat to lay some traps and lines and move about. The whole evening I could envision myself finally bursting through that door in the hostel and being reunited with everyone. And we'll probably laugh and cry about it all. I got some sleep eventually on a wooden plank and was woken by the fisherman in the morning. It was just starting to get light. I didn't want to look outside, like where the hell will I be now? But what a relief to see we are anchored by the coast with the same mountain backdrop right there, I even knew which way it was to the hostel as we had ridden past this stretch on our bikes yesterday. Probably just a couple of miles along the coast to the hostel. We jumped in his teapot boat to get to shore, I helped him carry his catch from the night until his wife met us half way. Once we got to the main road I wanted to leave but was invited along to their house just nearby. Met his family and ate some Vietnamese pancakes for breakfast. I wrote down the name of the hostel on a piece of paper and someone he called was able to locate it. So we jumped on his scooter so he could take me back. We dropped his kid off to school first thing. Again, riding through a little village past loads of people and there's some white guy with no shirt and a bright orange life vest on. So many confused stares going on. After that he took me to my hostel at around 7am. It was over, I made it. I can't believe it, the smile on my face. Last night I had imagined the joy and happiness of meeting my buddies once I get back at least one hundred times. Laughs, tears and hugs. That wasn't the welcome I got though. Maybe my approach was misread. I opened the door to the little house we were all in, dropped to my knees and yelled, Gooooood Morning Vietnam! People woke up and I was just sworn at, shouted at etc. Understandable. Eventually I told the whole story and said I was stuck. Couldn't have told you guys in any way, I really tried. I even wanted to risk my safety and swim back after the boat but was told there are dangerous currents out there. I actually can't believe I would have done that, had the person on the phone just said no sharks and nothing else. The group were more understanding, but the mood was still sombre.

The escapade wasn't over though. Had some financial conclusion to come to with the hostel owner due to the lost kayak etc. Me saying the kayak let water in and basically broke on me after just a few hours in the water, him suspecting me of simply crashing into an island or just somehow breaking it, because apparently it's impossible for it to just let water in like that. I said well it did, so explain to me how that's possible as that's the entire cause of the situation and him saying the kayaks get checked every evening and signed off. I pushed on with, well risk assessments get signed and look how many people die in the construction industry, some signatures don't eliminate accidents. Sure it was reckless to not return before sundown, but the root of the issue was still the kayak just letting water in. I would have been just fine. We weren't getting anywhere but I offered to pay for half of the kayak, plus pay in full for the three search and rescues that got sent out looking for me in the night. Pretty grateful they actually did that for me. I actually saw one of those boats. Late in the evening when looking out to sea from my boat I could see a boat far away tracing a flashlight around the second island. This was hours after I had gotten onto the boat. Apparently, I was all over social media and all the nearby coastal villages had been informed and were looking out for me. Also, the police and customs had been notified and were on their way over. What a mess. It was shit because it was my word against the owner's, and I really didn't have a leg to stand on. At least the owner was American so I could talk to him. I told him I have the entire trip recorded on my watch and I didn't crash into any damn islands. Just need to upload it and I can show him that I came to a stop in front of the island but I never went onto it. He just said if I don't pay I'll be taken to court and get totally fucked, this ain't England this is Viet Nam. Things work differently here. But I didn't buckle and told him it's lucky I've got some evidence at hand so yeah let's wait for the police to get here then. He asked me is it really worth ruining the rest of my trip over this, but he underestimated my stubbornness and I wasn't gonna budge, plus my last few days had been so incredible I didn't even care at this point. Bring it. He was not happy and said why I wouldn't at least pay for half of the kayak to which I yelled, I already offered that solution twenty minutes ago but you weren't having it. So we finally reached an agreement. I paid £90 for the three search and rescues which were remarkably cheap and about £250 for half the kayak as kayaks are not so cheap. Or maybe I still got conned. I got my passport back and got the hell out of there before the police got there. And was it good I did. After I got back from the trip and uploaded the file, due to the accuracy of little rocky islands in the sea and the GPS, it actually suggested I went like 50m into the island. I would have been totally fucked in court going by that evidence. Yet, looking at the map again now in 2022, it shows that I stopped right by the island as supposed to. Must be the maps which have been updated but it wouldn't have done me any favours at the time.