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Published: February 4th 2007
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Bonjour mes amies,
Been a busy few days in the south of Vietnam hitting Saigon followed by setting off on a two day trip up the Mekoing into Cambodia.
The bad news is that we didn't find any new beers in Saigon - we probably overdid it in the first week or two in Vietnam and seem to have left nothing for the end. The good news is that Saigon had excellent (and the cheapest so far) Bia Hoi and 3 KFC's.
We had a final night in Dalat with the Norwegians before saying farewell as they headed off to the South coast while we came down to Saigon. We actually managed to find a bar that stayed open till 11.15pm so a big improvement on the previous two nights.
Bus to Saigon was very long and boring. Nothing interesting happened at all and we arrived at about 5pm.
Found a hotel quite quickly but it was quite a dive for $8 with no window and a noisy clunky air con system. Cathy checked the bathroom and found the flush didn't work so we scarpered quickly.
20 minutes later we were holed up in a
much nicer place for the same money. Not an actual hotel - just a family's house and when they can rent it out they just kip downstairs in the lounge. Very bizarre.
Met up with an English couple we had met in Nha Trang at a beautiful, authentic local Vietnamese bar called Guns 'N' Roses. Played non stop heavy metal and had very camp pictures of the band on the walls but Alex and Verity assured us the beer was the cheapest they found. We were soon to prove them wrong.
A very surreal moment or two in the bar. After a couple of games of killer, I got challenged to a game of pool..... by a local ladyboy.
Thankfully she / he was terrible and I didn't suffer the embarassment of losing. One of those things that only happens to you once I think.
After that we left to go to a Bia Hoi place which was 5 pence a pint. Beautiful. Unbelieveably, Alex had never sampled Bia Hoi and it was their last night in Vietnam. Understandably he was distraught but I consoled him with the fact that i had two more evenings of
Bia Hoi left.
Up and about early the next day and hit all the sights around town, bought some souvenirs and did all the usual touristy stuff and then had a quiet night in with a book or two (and no alcohol - first in a while).
The next day was our trip to the tunnels of Cu Chi where the VC fought the Americans.
First stop was a Caodai temple who are a weird religion which blend all other religions together and come up with a big colourful mess which even has Victor hugo and Willy Shakespeare as some kind of saints. Unbelievably it has about 3m followers out here.
After that it was off to the tunnels which were really good but tiny. I only just squeezed into them. We travelled about 100m down the tunnels on 3 different levels (the bottom one was about 10m down and only about 60cm x 40cm. Needless to say, despite my svelte body and the fact that I was on hands and knees I still got my big rump stuck a couple of times.
I emerged looking a lot like I did when I finished the
Great North Run. Those of you there that day will know what I mean. It wasn't pretty. It was about 32 degrees outside and like an oven inside the tunnels.
Next up was some guns. We wandered past a shooting area and the guide asked if anyone wanted to shoot. I really wanted to shout "Hell, yeah", but it came out as "Yes please, I'd love to fire a shiny rifle".
About 8 young blokes and Mrs Deane stepped up to the plate to choose weapons. Standard American issue M16 rifle for Mrs Deane and for myself....?
...AK47. If you absolutely, positively got to kill every, um, person, in the room. Accept no substitute.
Dang, those guns are loud. We only had 5 shots each but they were very lively.
Tea was an old comfortable friend... The Colonol, or as the wise Mr Boddingotn would say - grey chicken.
In the evening we had our final Bia Hoi in Vietnam and were up early the next day to head off for the Mekong delta. Bia Hoi has probably been the best friend a man could meet whilst travelling and will be sorely missed.
The tour started with a couple hour bus ride out into the countryside. We then jumped on a boat and spent about 3 hours cruising up and down the river past floating villages and markets and handicraft places. Had lunch by the side of the river while we waited for the tide to come in so we could make our way up some of the smaller, shallower canals.
When the river had reached about 60cm deep we were good to go. The crew then told about 10 of us to sit right at the front to balance the weight so that we didn't get grounded. All good fun, even when the boat broke down for 10 minutes.
Finally finished our boat trip and took a really bumpy 2 hour bus journey to Chau Doc on the border. Booked into the hotel and straight out for dinner. Spent the evening with a Canadian couple and Mrs Deane and I worked our way through 2 bottles of Dalat wine and a few beers as we tried desperately to spend our last few hundred thousand dongs.
All in all, Vietnam has been a great country and we've thoroughly enjoyed ourselves
here. Would recommend it to anyone for the Bia Hoi, food, ease of travel, cheapness, variety, the weather (in the south), scenery and all kinds of craziness (in particular the driving).
See you all in a new country - Cambodia next.
Dave & Mrs Deane
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Sara
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Dave's pulling prowess suddenly takes a turn for the worse..
Dave getting propositioned by a ladyboy eh....now there's a first! (he hopes) Was laughing lots! x