Day 20 On the Mekong & Can Tho

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Day 20
Another good nights sleep. omelette, bread and watermelon for breakfast. The bus was picking us up for the tour to the Mekong river at 9am. A young girl Huong arrived and said she was our guide. We all got in a car, we thought to take us to the coach.... no, this is a private tour just me and Lesley, Mr Brave our driver and Houng. No wonder it was expensive! 4 star hotel tonight ! Houng provided much information about Vietnam on the way. Politics and the economy seem to be a favourite with tour guides. She explained that if you wish to get to management level within a school, hospital or any government office you had to say you had no religious beliefs. Being a communist party in power if you have a religious belief you don't get bonuses or promotion.

After 2 hours drive we got to the river. It's very busy with tourists. But hey, Lesley and I have a boat to ourselves! I The river was brown, large and had Water hydrangea growing and floating by. We were on the low river we will go to the high river tomorrow. It's very industrial. Huge barges carrying sand from the river to Saigon to use in cement. Large fishing boats. There are 4 islands nearby - unicorn, Phoenix, dragon and tortoise. We are going to unicorn which is where Huong was born.

We landed on the island and were shown fruit growing. Many i'd not heard of. Longan, jack fruit, Custard Apple. Mangosteen, rambutan. We seated and some of the fruit was available for us to try. We had pineapple dipped in chilli and salt apparently it's the ying yang you need - sweet and sour. Chom chom, lady finger bananas, water melon. Local people came and sang at our table which was an experience but they wouldn't win X factor ! We were then escorted to the bee hive. The bees are very small. We were given a honey tea drink to try and dried bananas and ginger. Huong told us a lot about traditional medicine. It is preferred to man made medicine. She showed us a jar with happy water in and a very large cobra.

Vietnamese are brought up to believe that if they pray to the right gods, live a respectful life and take traditional medicine, they will live a long life. A high percentage of people are Buddhist and believe in reincarnation. Therefore you want to be healthy in body and mind to take you into your next life.

We transferred to a small boat and were taken through the mangroves. We were told to keep all parts of our body in the boat as there were crocodile in the river. A lady sat at the front of the boat and paddled us through the narrow canals. It was really special. Just what is imagined. There were Water coconuts on the trees. These are fed to animals as they are not was ant for people to eat.

We then Set off walking through an orchard. Huong picked herbs along the way and we had to guess what they were. We were told a local taxi was picking us up - it was a Horse and cart. We had a lovely slow trip up the lane to a larger motorised boat. Huong explained we were going for lunch on Phoenix island. We went much deeper into the mangroves. It was so pretty. We passed all the tourist boats and went to our own landing place. We were treated like royalty. Lunch came and all I can say is wow. We had elephant ear fish. It came while on a stake. We had shrimp spring rolls vegetables noodles rice and chicken. A lady came to show us how to make a rice paper roll from the fish noodles and veg. It was delicious. We also had sticky rice. It's hard to explain but it looks like a giant bauble and is sweet and deep fried .... Lovely!


After lunch returned to boat. Stopped off to give the remains of our fish to a local dog who'd just had puppies.

Back to the Private car. We are staying at the Best hotel. Huong showed us around for an hour. There's a large bronze statue of ho chi min, the riverside was all lit up and there was a small market. There was a performance going on with actors in the street. We stood and watched for a while. It was a musical about Vietnam war. Although we couldn't understand there was much passion in the performance. We decided to try the street food. There was chicken feet but we had a small Vietnam pizza which was made from rice paper. Very nice.

Huong took us to the Chinese assembly hall. Lesley spoke with master ( fortune teller) who predicted a bright future.

Huong left and we went for dinner. We sat booked siem reap hotel. All hotels booked now. Only a week left! Looking forward to Cambodia

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