My Actifit Report Card and ulog: Botanical Gardens in Phong Nha

It's our second day here in Phong Nha, Vietnam and instead of doing another organised tour, which will cost us around another $75 each, we decided to do our own thing. Luckily, our homestay have bicycles, which they rent out for FREE to all guests. We knew the route to Phong Nha's Botanical Garden in the national park would be 12km one way from our homestay, but what we forgot is that as soon as we enter the national park there is a 10% incline from the bottom of the mountain to the middle part. It wasn't too bad as it was the last bit of the journey. Overall, the journey there took us an hour and a half whereas our homestay host said it would take 2 hours. He underestimated our fitness and ability.
Once at the Botanical Garden, we had to pay 40,000 Dong each to get in and it was meant to be 5,000 each for the parking, but since the lady saw that we cycled all the way and were sweating our asses off, she didn't charge us.
The Botanical Gardens has three routes that you can do:

Route 1: Waterfall only - 40 minutes (2.5km)
Route 2: Lake and waterfall - 1hr30 mins (6km)
Route 3: Lake, waterfall and long jungle trek - 3 hours (12km)

We chose Route 2 as we were dying to get into a water source to cool down plus we had a long day of trekking the day before, so route 3 was out of the question.
The lake in the end was a small swimming spot as you can see from the photos below. The waterfall wasn't at its best as the rainy season is late. Yet, we had an enjoyable time exploring another side of the national park by ourselves.

The view from above the waterfall looking out

The "lake" - swimming spot

The swing by the "lake"

The river that flows out of Phong Nha national park

View from our room at the homestay in Phong Nha

Cycling, Daily Activity, Walking