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Published: November 2nd 2009
Saigon -HCMC We arrived in Ho Chi Minh City (HCMC) or Saigon at around 2pm after a pretty reasonable bus journey. The locals still like to call it Saigon because the Southern Vietnamese are not as communist as the northern and prefer not to call it HCMC, which is what is was named after the fall of Saigon over 30 years ago. It is a massive city and the centre of all the commerce and finance in the country, it sprawls over 12 districts and is the biggest city in Vietnam. A lot bigger than Hanoi but Hanoi is still the capital city and where the government is based because that is where the Communism all stems from. We arrived on Sunday when the roads were quite quiet but if you see it at rush hour there are more motorbike than people. We got off the bus and found ourself a nice family run guest house right in the centre of town. Dropped of our bags and went for a wander to see what was around and went and had some lunch in Allez Boo. Took a walk through the park at dusk and realised we had got ourselves caught
Miss Saigon cocktail
at the buy one get on free barup in the Vietnamese powerwalking session!! In the evening, when the temperature cools down, all the Vietnamese are out in the park doing their exercise. Ranging from walking, running, badminton, football volleyball and a game of keepy uppies with a modified shuttle cock - hundreds of them. We went out for some dinner and drinks and found a 2 for 1 beer bar so made the most of that!!
Next morning we got ourselves some brekkie and wanted to see the sights. Out of nowhere, in the restaurant, popped up a cyclo driver who looked like a mixture between Mr Miagi and Uncle Ho - he sold us a cyclo tour of the city and it was well worth it. We headed off in the hectic Saigon traffic in a glorified shopping trolley with our guide on the back peddling us. Poor lad who got the pleasure of me - any time we got to a slight incline he had to get off and push it. It was very enjoyable experience and our first stop was the War Remnants Museum. It was originally called the 'American War Crimes Museum' and it does exactly what it says on the tin.
Outside they have the customary stolen American equipment which they have at every war museum but inside was a different story. There are countless photos of the merciless torture that the Americans inflicted. The completely unjust bombings of small villages because there was a possibility they may have been Viet Cong and the brutal massacres of towns, majority of women and children, because they may be VC. How can a 2 year old child be a threat to anyone!! It is a very shocking museum. The next section is about agent orange and how it affected the Vietnamese people and their beautiful landscape. Not only that, the way it caused so many problems for their own soldiers. They also have deformed foetuses and more shocking images - the most famous being of the girl (Kim Phuc) running naked with her skin burning form the napalm. I found it very shocking and I have been there before and Zo just as much. Upstairs they have a huge section of photographs taken by military photographers and it looks just like screens from 'Apocolypse Now' with Martin Sheen. Outside they have a mock up of the tiger cage prisons which were on Phu
Quoc Island. It was where the political prisoners were kept and tortured by the French. From there we got back on our cyclo and they took us the the mini Lacquer factory. It was very interesting to see how they put the mother of pearl and duck egg onto a canvas to make a picture and then add layer and layer of lacquer. It takes 3 months of lacquering and sanding to get it perfect and some of the pieces were stunning. Zo and I bought ourselves some clasic Vietnamese scenes so we can always remember our trip. Back on the cyclo we were off to the Botanical Gardens - got our ticket and walked around in the blistering heat to see a really bad maintained Zoo. Didn't stay there for long before we went to take a photo of the Notre Dame Cathedrale, not the actual one and the Post Office. Built in 1880 and 1886 they were very lucky not to get bombed in any of the many wars!! We then went to the HCMC museum which wasn't as good. It was about the growth of the city from agriculture to economic - not really our cup of
tea. Then back to the hotel and we were very happy that we had chosen a cyclo because it was by far the best way to explore the city! We then took a walk to Than Bien market, which is a huge indoor market selling products ranging from lacquer and t shirts to dried pigs head and eels - a wide selection for all!!! As we walked through the doors we were mobbed by women trying to sell us tourist crap - they were obviously very intelligent women because they were telling me what a handsome man I was!! Had nothing to do with making the sale!! Once I had got my arm back from them we carried on wandering - couldn't make it to the food section because the smell was too much for Zo to handle, and to be honest - it was foul!!
Went out and had ourself a light dinner and found a nice bar down the back streets to have a few beers. Well, nice until the dried squid selling lady walked passed and there was the smell again. Some important Vietnamese family turned up next to us and took all our attention -
bastards!! The dad was the Peter Stringfellow of Saigon, with his long grey hair!! Headed off home for our early flight to Phu Quoc.
Phu Quoc So an eventful night sleep for zo who managed to fall out of bed because of the lack of friction between the polyester sheets and her sleeping bag but no damage done and off to HCMC domestic airport. Slightly bigger than Bergerac international, we waited for our Vietnam Airways flight. We got onto the bus to transfer us to the plane, driving past all these lovely big airbuses, only to arrive at our 66 seater, propeller driven tin can. Flight was ok and got picked up at airport to go to our resort - Thousand Star Resort. We think maybe that was a self proclaimed title as it was a heap of ..... It was at the end of town and we had to drive over bumpy, pot hole ridden clay mud roads. We were led to our sea view bungalow - more like building site view!! We made an executive decision that we were going to suck it up and leave and lose the money we had paid and head
to The Saigon resort and spa - 4 star and real ones as well!! It was beautiful and we had a bungalow looking over the beach and a huge swimming pool. We chillaxed all day by the pool with a few drinks and got some rays. I have manged to pick up an awesome tan - if you look at me through sunglasses and in a dim light but luckily Zo has got one all the time.
The next day we were up for some breakfast and going to another beach the other side of the island. Phu Quoc is a small island in the South China sea owned by Vietnam and Cambodia. It is supposed to be the 2nd most beautiful beach in the world - yeah right!! It is nice but Blackpool and it's raw sewage would give it a run for it's money!! Anyway - we got in our bus with Duc 'Schumacher' at the wheel. Phu Quoc haven't really grasped the concept of making the roads big enough for 2 cars. He probably would have made it in F1, if F1 cars had horns because that took up more of his attention than concentrating on
the road. We got there in record time and chilled on the beach - a very relaxing time for us. Went back to the hotel at a similar speed and walked into town to get some dinner. Up the next morning for a swim and then back on our Cessna for the flight home. Got back to Saigon in rush hour, which was nice. Our little Vietnamese friends had been busy while we are away and set up a big party in the park for the 3rd Indoor Asian Games. We had a walk around there and then went for some 2 for 1 beers and wandered!!
Next morning we were up nice and early for our trip to the Cu Chi Tunnels. On the bus with a different sort of driver for the slowest trip in the world. When the government bought in traffic laws 3 years ago, they went to the US and saw that their small roads had a limit of 50. They chose to copy this idea, not realising that it was in mph and not kmph - which means it can be very slow!! Stopped off on the way at a Handicap Handycraft shop
but managed not to buy anything and about 2 hours later we arrived a Cu Chi. Cu Chi is a province in Southern Vietnam that was held by Viet Cong guerrillas. In 1945 they built 20km of tunnels to get away from the French. By the time the Yanks came they had over 200km. Some people were born, lived and died there. An amazing feet of engineering. A lot of the soldiers that fought there have high ranking jobs in the government because they were thought as the real heroes of the war and manged to kill so many Americans. We got there, sat down and watched a classic 1969 propaganda video about the tunnels. Very anti US. We then got to look around and see how small they were, some of the traps they used to kill the yanks and how they dispersed the smoke from their underground fires by building fake termite mounds. Very clever and interesting. They would fight by day and plough by night. Last stop was to go down the tunnels - Zo decided not to go and wisely so. They were tiny, especially for a hefty lad like myself and I was on all
fours sweating in the mud!! Back on the bus and back to Saigon. We the headed back to the market to get ourself more crap to send home and got hounded again! Then the heavens opened up and Saigon became a swimming pool!! To solve this dilemma we bought some fetching plastic raincoat and I managed to rip it putting it over my massive head. Rain dried up and out for dinner we went. We decided to go to the other district in Saigon for dinner and as we were walking down we bumped into Steve on his was back from Cambodia - small world! Got on a couple of moto taxis and off we went. This district is obviously for the rich and expats. Loads of big 5 star hotels, fine dining restaurants, designer label shops and whore bars!! Everything a rich westerner needs. We decided not to eat there because a bit pricey and went back to district 1 for some dinner and caught up with Steve in Eden bar. They were having their Halloween party the night before because the Dublin lad that owns it thought it'd be busier and he was right. Only problem was the
electricity kept going off so most of the night we were having drinks in darkness!! Off to bed for early start the next day to the Mekong Delta.
Up at 6.30am to get boat to the Mekong delta. We set of down the scanky Saigon river to join the Mekong for our 3 hour boat journey there. The Mekong is in the 5th longest river in the world and spans over 8000km from china all the way to Vietnam. The locals call it the Cuulong river, which means nine dragons - they love their dragons our here!! We disembarked from the boat onto an island and walked to a Bee Hive farm - had some honey tea and other honey treats before walking round to the fruit gardens. We got to sample different types of tropical fruit for example, Dragon Fruit (more dragons), Pineapple and the rest I cannot pronounce let a lone attempt to write. The bitter fruits you dip in salt and chilli mixture which was surprisingly nice! We were then treated to the delights of local tribal folk music. I'm thinking Simon Cowell wont be heading to vietnam for Tribal Idol because it was awful!! From
Tom floating
at the new better hotel there we moved to our second boat of the day which was a tiny, rocky rowing boat and got rowed around the canals to our next stop - a slightly bigger motor boat then to a smaller motor boat. by this time we were pretty bored of boats. We stopped off at and island to see them make coconut candy and back on ANOTHER boat to an island for lunch. We then had 2 hours to kill so cycled into the village on a miniature bike and relaxed in a hammock! Back on the boat to the Mekong City to wait for our bus home. Had another hour to kill so tried to find a market. We got some very strange looks going into town from everyone and a lot of pointing - I dont know whether it was my height or maybe Zo's blonde hair but something was making us stand out. Our bus turned up and we had our 2 and a half hour journey back to Saigon. Overall we were dissappointed with the trip as it is was a long way to go to do not a lot. Back in Saigon we packed our bag for our
flight and went and had a lovely dinner - our last in Vietnam. Met up with Steve in Eden bar and got on the fishbowls of cocktail. A good night to finish in Vietnam but paid for it the next day.
Our time in Vietnam has been amazing and is still my favourite country. The people are the nicest in the world, the cuisine is fantastic and the scenery is stunnig. I recommend everyone to go see Vietnam in your lifetime. I am pleased to say that Zo loves it just as much as I do and we will definitely be back. Cam on Viet nam, tam biet and hen gap lai. Good morning Hong Kong - maybe I should have used that phrase for Vietnam instead!!
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Sally
non-member comment
What a fantastic country, I really would love to go myself one day. You must spend ages on your travelblog, but well worth it as it is both funny and educational! Enjoy the next stage of your journey. Love Auntie Sally x