Flooding Hoi An and Saigon

Spent 3 days in Hoi An which after the hustle and bustle of Hanoi was such a chilled out place, just what we needed. Hoi An is a little town along a river which is probably most famous for the amount of tailors who will whip something up for you for next to nothing. Becka took full advantage of this and purchased a whole new wardrobe and I even bought a few items...it would have been rude not to!

Unfortunately Vietnam is in the end of its rainy season and we experienced a fair chunk of this whilst there. It rained and it rained, not like the rain you have at home but really heavy and intense. The river burst its banks and flooded most of the town, almost making its way to the hotel we were staying in (luckily it stopped raining just before we left although we did spend two days wading through knee height water with rats and cockroaches....yum yum).

We spent the final morning phoning and chasing all our tailors (couldn't actually get to the shops as the water was neck height in some places). Felt a bit guilty as these poor people had flooded homes and shops and all we were doing was harassing them for our clothes! Still we pretty much got everything and Becka is shipping a container worth of stuff home by boat, 4 months they reckon!

We flew from Danang to Saigon and arrived in lovely sunshine (32 degrees) to a city completely contrasting Hanoi. Although it was pretty busy the streets were much wider, it seemed cleaner and it just had more of a buzz about it. Stayed in a really nice hotel (massive bathroom) right by a busy roundabout. Crossing this was one of the most hair raising experiences we've had so far, in Vietnam road signs and crossings are mere suggestions of what they'd like traffic to do, in order to cross a road you really can't hang around waiting for a free opportunity, you just have to walk right out and hope they all swerve around you.

For our last day in Saigon we went to the Cu Chi tunnels, this is where the Vietnamese of the Cu Chi area hid underground up to 10 meters down in tunnels for 25 years. Originally built to hide from the French but then later the Americans and the Chinese. The place was really interesting, we saw lots of examples of traps they made, usually ending with someone being impaled on bamboo spikes and we also got to go down part of the tunnel. People say that the tunnels have been enlarged for westerners but I don't believe this as you had to be the size of an oompa lumpa to be able to move around with ease in there. The tunnels were so cramped I had to squat and shuffle on my feet like a penguin and Becka nearly got her bottom stuck!!

After doing some a little more shopping in the market (Si got a vietnamese hat and t-shirt making him feel like a real GI) we took a 6 hour ride in a public bus to Cambodia. We thought the bus would be awful and full of chickens and goats but it was actually really comfortable and luxurious compared to what we had been getting used to. Last stop Cambodia and only 5 more days to go :-(

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