Monday, March 2, 2015

The Marble Mountains

While staying at the Hyatt Regency in Da Nang we took an outing to the Marble Mountains which were just down the road from the resort. We walked from the resort along the sidewalk and quickly crossed the busy road leading to the site.  There were many people in cars and on motorbikes that stopped to try to get us to come with them for a tour or give us a ride to our destination.  Everyone was so friendly! We kindly declined putting our kids on a stranger's motorbike. 

We purchased a ticket at the base of the mountain to take the elevator up - you can also hike up, but for obvious reasons we passed on this option. There was quite a bit of difficult climbing even after getting off of the elevator and Joe and I had to take turns carrying the girls up some of the crazy staircases carved into the stone. 

There were numerous caverns you could enter that contained Buddhist sanctuaries. While not an ideal outing for young children, I really loved this place and wished we could have explored a bit more.  

A very persistent saleswoman that had befriended us on our way through the village earlier was waiting for us when we departed the elevator on our way back down.  The village was filled with stone and sculpture shops and she was very hopeful/insistent that we purchase something at her family's shop. Unfortunately for her, the Becherers are not big souvenir people, especially of the rock variety. 

We arrived around 10am and it was a HOT day!
Lizzy making a donation/trying to pull money out of the box
It was hard to get a good photo of the largest cavern because of the lighting, but it was breathtaking!
Huge holes in the ceiling that filtered in light

Inside the main cavern





Annnd they've had enough. Time to go back to the pool!