Prologue
Ho Chi Minh Trail, Western Ho Chi Minh Road, and Central Highlands
Vietnam has held my curiosity since growing up in the 60s and coming of age in the 70s. Older kids in my neighborhood and in my scout troop were going to Vietnam to fight a war. Getting drafted was a very real possibility for many without deferments. A national lottery was held annually to determine the order by birthdate that 19 year-olds could be conscripted. I remember watching the drawing on a black and white television as a 17 year-old as my birthday was drawn as a relatively low number which implied being near the front of the line for being called if I were 19.
There were many reasons why I could have probably avoided being called. Nevertheless it was a very real prospect for youth at the time. With no internet and very limited media, where these young men were going – Vietnam – was a deeply mysterious place. I encountered few people who had been to Vietnam and returned, and none of them said anything about the experience in my presence. A neighborhood friend and classmate’s older brother went to Vietnam and died there. Walker Cronkite, an evening news guest in our house every night, would put up bits of film on the black and white TV along with a daily count of people killed on both sides.
History and childhood
Fighter jets would arc across the sky of my hometown as they trained for Vietnam in a designated area near the gulf coast. Movies romanticized the war in Vietnam. Folk and rock bands provided a wonderful antiwar soundtrack for my life’s adventures, one of which was getting a motorcycle license at age 15 while our car-bound peers had to wait to age 16 to drive. The mystery of Vietnam was present in the culture I experienced.
The war ended and the U.S. was not victorious – which meant the war and Vietnam did not get talked about much in social settings. This also meant that the mystery of Vietnam deepened for me. I did not get drafted. In fact, the nation recoiled from the experience so much that my cohort of 18 year-olds were not even required to register for the selective service and hence the draft.
Prone to travel
Leaving my Texas hometown for good at age 18, going to college at Stanford in California (with all the cultural adjustments that implied), girls, career, and modest adventures consumed my attention. I learned to be a pilot with my first lesson from a marine fighter pilot and Vietnam vet. I later learned aerobatics from a Vietnam veteran former navy fighter pilot (Don: How high do we have to be for this parachute to work? Instructor: “It doesn’t matter. If we break the airplane, try to get out and pull the chord. That’s all you can do.”)
Trading obsession for curiosity
I never lost my curiosity about Vietnam. I read many books, preferring firsthand accounts, from people who had been there. Sometime in the 80s while flying from Delhi to Hong Kong, I pressed my nose against the airliner window looking at the green velvet that is Vietnam for an hour while all the other passengers slept, wondering what it was like under that green canopy 6 miles below.
After helping Susan raise a wonderful child, now a courageous adult, and after wrapping up career number 3, my curiosity of Vietnam fully germinated. I had to see and experience it for myself. Obsession they call it. And as my body ages, I had a strong sense that if I were to experience Vietnam as adventure travel, the time horizon to do so is not infinite.
Tours are not for me
I am not one for tours. My work required extensive travel, many hundreds of flights, rental cars, and thousand++ nights in hotels. Done. I have had enough of all that. No, my Vietnam itch could not be scratched with something found on a brochure or from a travel agent. I would have to figure it out for myself, rolling my own adventure as they say.
Besides, the places that hold the biggest mysteries of Vietnam for me are off the beaten path (serious understatement) and not where I would expect to find tourists. In fact, they are not suitable for a bus or car. Channeling my first solo and untethered travel adventures growing up, I decided to see Vietnam from the seat of a motorcycle. Except for hiking, there is no more unobstructed view than that from a motorcycle.
Firsthand
I have met precious few people who have been to Vietnam. None of the people I know have done it by motorcycle.
I tell my Vietnam by motorcycle story as a few adventure episodes and via my daily travel journal.
