We left the sex motel early the next morning with the hope of having a solid day in Saigon. As we approached the city the traffic picked up a LOT, and I was ready to return my bike. However, about 20 kilometers outside of the city Ryan blew his back tire, again. Luckily we were stopped at a stoplight, and he felt the air coming out of his tire....or else that could have been bad news. Again, there was a motorbike repair shop only 50 meters away, only this time they took 5 minutes to replace the tube. They charged Ryan 50,000 dong - $3. That's 1/4 of what our 'host' charged us! Haha we got ripped off. But hey, if I were living in a little bungalow in Nowhereville, Vietnam, I'd rip off a tourist too! (We really didn't get ripped off because the experience was worth much more than 200,000 dong).
When we arrived in Saigon, Ryan drove straight to the motorbike rental place. I though it would be a better idea to find a guesthouse before we returned our bikes so we could drop off our BACKPACKS, and maybe clean the MUD off of our bikes. Luckily the motorbike rental lady didn't seem to care, and didn't ask why the bikes were covered in mud, or why we had giant backpacks, or why there were hammocks stored under the seat!
After returning the bikes, Ryan and I were famished, and decided to grab lunch before we looked for a guesthouse. We chose the closest place in sight, which turned out to be an overpriced cafe right in the center of the tourist/guesthouse section of the city. We both had so-so meals, but that was tipped into the not-so-pleasant meal category when I watched a giant rat run down the steps from the kitchen to the dining area of the restaurant.
While eating our meals, a drunken (completely wasted) Australian expat joined us and talked to Ryan for at least an hour. (Everybody talks to Ryan and not me. It's quite interesting. I wasn't interested in talking to this old, drunken washed up expat anyways, but Ryan was. But the Vietnamese prefer to talk to him over me as well. I think they like Ryan because, as the kids in our homestay house claimed, he looks like Bill Clinton!) Anyways, the Aussie claimed he built schools in foreign countries, but his story seemed a little fishy. I opted to go search for a guesthouse, and found a decent one for $8 a night.
I dragged Ryan away from the drunken Aussie to show him the room I had reserved for a night, and when he saw it he said "yeah, it's nice except for that cockroach over there being devoured by ants. Hmmmm, I missed that somehow when inspecting the room. Ryan got a room at the place anyways.
We had half a day to kill in Saigon, and Ryan didn't have a clue what to do, so I made it my mission to find 'weasel coffee'. This Vietnamese coffee is supposedly world renowned for its bold flavor, and it is special because the beans are first fed to weasels, who then excrete the coffee beans, which are then cleaned off (or so I imagine) and presumably roasted? I located some weasel coffee in the Ben Thanh market, and plan to give it a try when I meet up with mum.
Ryan and I wandered the city a bit more, and then decided to splurge on a nice dinner. Lonely Planet wrote up a restaurant in Saigon that is a training center for disadvantaged youth, and apparently has wonderful food. We decided to take a taxi to the restaurant, and give it a try. What Lonely Planet didn't mention is that the restaurant is farrrr outside of the city center. A $5 taxi ride later (that's expensive!), we arrived at the restaurant, only to be told that the chef was sick and the restaurant was closed for the night. Another $5 taxi ride later, we arrived at a very nice restaurant in an old french villa. Dinner was $10 each at what appeared to be one of the classiest places in Saigon.
We had planned to check out the nightlife in Saigon, but were both so worn out from our motorbike adventure that we crashed early.
Vietnam's Flag
Map of Vietnam