What blood soup and dragonfruit teach cyclists about tourism in Vietnam

A good dinner, it has been said, contains within its sequence a celebration of life on earth. You start with the primeval soup, evolve through fish, fowl and flesh, before reaching the climax, which I presume must mean pudding with custard, the very acme of human sophistication. What then, I wondered, staring at the dishes before me, does this meal add up to? There was a bowl of blood, pig's apparently, and next to it a brace of chicken's feet lying on – I peered closer – its head, with beak intact. In the centre was a plate of land crabs and beside them dishes of meat, salads and roots. And my prospective host was leaning forward grinning and offering me a small porcelain cup brimming with a cloudy liquid. "Rice wine," said Cuong, my Vietnamese translator. "A special type." An alarm bell sounded. I raised a querying eyebrow. Cuong thought carefully before speaking. "Part of a goat is soaked in this wine." "Which part?" He glanced at my daughter, Maddy (nine), to make sure she wasn't listening, then whispered, "Penis." I could see Maddy grinning. "You want me to drink goat willy wine?" He smiled. "Actually, you cannot refuse. The wine is already poured. It would be …" He raised his hands, unable to express the awful social implications. The towering edifice of human cultural evolution would topple. I took the cup. "Please thank the gentleman for the kind offer of brunch, but tell him I have eaten." This was true and seemed to be an acceptable excuse. Now for the goat wine toast. We all chanted together. "Mot, hai, ba, YO!" (Vietnamese for "1, 2, 3, dial emergency services".) Actually, it wasn't too bad, tasting just like any other rice wine. Mine Host, who had clearly been making significant attacks on the special reserve goat wine, was beaming with pleasure. Why did he drink that stuff? "Very good for health!" He made a universal gesture for male potency. His wife giggled. Actually I don't believe it was his wife because when I took out the camera she gave a nervous giggle and ran away. You have to admire the Vietnamese ability to turn unappetising parts of animals into delicacies. They leave a clean plate. Your grandparents would approve. No faddiness. No waste. A quarter of an hour later we were on our bikes again: myself, my 16-year-old son Niall, Maddy and Cuong. We were on a cycling trip that would encompass homestays and national parks, taking us from the Mai Chau valley some 100 miles south-wes