Vietnam & Singapore - to Mekong and back

---

We headed off south in the morning rush hour, making our way towards our homestay in the Mekong Delta. It was just over a 4-hour drive, and as the journey progressed the rice fields became more prolific and greener, and the roads were lined with coconut and banana trees.

We drove over what Mr T told us was the longest bridge in Vietnam, but I can’t find it on t’internet, so I’m not able to confirm that fact.

Around half of all the rice produced in the country is grown in the Mekong Delta region, and there are numerous fish farms, the region being hugely important for food production. It’s a vast maze of rivers, swamps and islands, the main form of transportation being boats. There are nine rivers flowing to the East Sea, and they’re known as the Nine Dragon Rivers.

As we passed through the towns, we saw lots of local shops selling Bonsai trees and colourful ornamental plants. It is certainly a green and fertile area.

I noticed that there seemed to be more Christian churches around too.

We were greeted by the lovely family at our homestay and shown to our rooms. Susan and I had three beds in ours with a fan ceiling fan and a basic wet room with loo. The mattresses on the beds were only about 6cm thick, and there was a simple blanket to snuggle under with a reasonably comfy pillow; it would be ok for our one night.

We were going fishing for our supper, so we changed into what I can only describe as thin brown button-up pyjamas and headed out to the mud pool in the back garden. Yep, we would be mud fishing for snakehead fish. Well, what fun that was! Those of us who chose to get in the mud were thigh-deep, trying hard not to fall face first. I’m sure you can imagine the screams and laughter as we fished around in the mud with our hands in an attempt to grab the fish who lived in there. I was good at spotting them as their dorsal fins broke the surface of the water – well, more just liquid mud – and Brenda got the medal for grabbing most of them. Some really didn’t want to be caught, and put up quite a fight, a couple got away and had to be re-caught! The homestay owner was sitting on the bank laughing at our shenanigans, almost as much as we were laughing ourselves, in between the squeals! We ended up with five fish in the bucket, recorded for posterity on the cameras of those who decided to stay clean.

Of course, before we could head back to our rooms for a shower we needed to be hosed off – more fun and laughter!

A few of us went for a wander along the lane that the homestay was on. It was a beautiful place, running along a gently flowing river, and lined with coconut trees and other colourful foliage and flowers. The homes appeared to be in good repair, and many had dogs who took delight in warning us off their territory. The local people were really friendly, many saying hello as we strolled past them, and one young man even inviting us into his garden – we of course declined.

The next activity was a 10km-ish bike ride led by Mr T. About six of us joined in and we rode gently through local villages and along riverside paths. We visited a local Cao Dai temple, a religion I was not previously familiar with. Mr T explained that it is a relatively new religion, officially established in southern Vietnam in 1926, now being the third largest religion in the country, and with around 5 million followers. It has been described as the most inclusive religion in the world, uniting many faiths, and teaches that human duty is to promote world peace. If only!

We had a cooking lesson before supper, making spring rolls for our starter, and very yummy they were too. Dinner was followed by a game of Uno for four of us while others, including Susan, decided on an early night. We played around six games in total, and I won one.

We rose at 07:00 to climb a ladder and harvest ourselves a fresh green coconut which was opened for us to drink – it was one of the sweetest coconuts I’ve ever had. If only we could grow them in the UK!

After a bit more morning sustenance we embarked on a short boat ride in small boats along a minor tributary from the homestay to the main Mekong River, where we transferred to a larger boat. The noise of the engine reminded me of the African Queen; what a fantastic film that is!

Our first visit was to a brick and ceramics factory. There were two massive brick kilns, one lit and being looked after by a woman on the day shift. The kilns are fuelled by rice husks and have to be kept at some ridiculously hot temperature over several days while the 30,000 brinks inside are fired, then the fire is allowed to go out and the kiln cool down over the next week or so. It was hot enough just standing a few metres away from it, on top of the heat of the day, I can only imagine how unpleasant it must be for those having to deliver the rice husks into the kiln to keep it lit. The woman did have a large bottle of water nearby, but that would have been warm too!

The factory also produces various vases and plant pots, with several women working mainly part time, and paid per piece rather than an hourly wage. We were shown how a square plant pot was made using a mould and I watched another woman add decoration at the leatherhard stage using lace rolled into the outside of the pot before being carefully pulled off leaving an imprint of the pattern on the clay.

There were several small children of the workers running around the factory – the HSE in the UK would have had a meltdown!

The next visit was to a candy factory where we watched some coconut sweeties being made and packed in a 3-stage process, and all by hand, none of your large machine produced produce here! We also watched some peanut candy being made by a couple of men over a very hot fire, again all by hand, and with no safety equipment. A couple of women were sitting packing the peanut sweets and some popped-rice candy, their children working with them. This was a Saturday, so no school, and they were being paid to work, so overall probably a good thing for them to be learning skills, a work ethic, and not be sat in front of a screen all day.

We were served jasmine tea and little nibbles, and bought some sweet things to take away with us. All rather yummy!

We moved on to a honey factory, and I held some bees with their honeycomb – Bee with bees! There are only a few hives river-side, with the main hives being further out in the countryside. The bees were very calm, and the bee-keeper, dressed just in his normal clothes, as were we, had a few sticks of lit incense which he waved around occasionally. I didn’t feel at all under threat. My UK bee-keeper friend said she wouldn’t be able to open her hives without wearing a full bee suit!

There were lots of honey, royal jelly, and other bee products to buy, including a bottle of bee larvae, or so we were told. I’m not sure what the larvae were supposed to do, and I didn’t buy anything from here.

Our bus picked us up and took us back to the homestay where we had lunch before heading back to Saigon for our second goodbye meal – yes, our extra days were coming to an end!

We had a 15-minute walk to the restaurant, Susan and I both in our glad-rags, and would you believe it started raining about half-way through the walk?! At first the rain teased us a bit – was it just going to be a drizzle? Nope, it wasn’t! It developed into quite a heavy downpour, and I stumbled through the restaurant door with my linen top soaked through in places, and with my bag held over my head. At least it was warm enough to dry us off fairly quickly, although a brief visit to the ladies was required by a few of us to tidy up the hair.

The goodbyes at the table were heartfelt and emotional. This was going to be the last time we were all together, with some leaving for the airport very early in the morning. We each gave Mr T a thank you card and of course some monetary recompense for having put up with us for 17 whole days! He deserved every dong!

Susan and I said goodbye to those still at the hotel at breakfast in the morning, and from my part I did have leaky eyes when it was time for Mr T to leave us. Susan just rolled her eyes at me!

We, along with Kathleen, weren’t leaving until the following morning, so we had some time to spend exploring the city a bit more. Kathleen went out for the day with Aidee and Brenda who weren’t leaving until the afternoon, and they sent photos and videos from their adventure on a scooter taxi and their trip up the Landmark 81 tower, the highest building in Saigon at 472m to the tip. I thought the funniest bit was Aidee’s face as they descended in the glass walled lift!

There was a final piece of info required to complete the Saigon Tourist Trail AdLab cache, so Susan and I navigated our way to the Independence Palace to collect it. There were some large-ish roads to cross, but we made it - by the skin of our teeth on a couple of crosses!

Annoyingly, the gel nails I had done in Hoi An were starting to chip, so we found somewhere for me to get them redone, while Susan had her legs waxed and massaged. It was a cleaner, more professional set up than the previous one, and even as I type now, 9 days on they’re still perfect!

After a salt coffee – you really need to try one! - we navigated our way to the Hop On Hop Off with the help of some locals – thank goodness for Google Translate! I do love a HOHO, although this one wasn’t very long, and didn’t provide a huge amount of information

Lunch was mango salad with shrimp, followed by a quiet afternoon of blogging and finishing the bottle of wine we had in our room.

We had arranged to meet Kathleen for dinner at Terraviva; really happy to visit the restaurant again, and a good meal was had by all, including the complimentary limoncello! I wrote a Trip Advisor review for them – it’s certainly worth the climb up the stairs.

Kathleen was leaving at stupid o’clock in the morning, so we said goodbye before retiring for the night.

Tomorrow we’re heading to Singapore.

---