Phu Quoc

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Well we have now arrived in Phu Quoc, but first some news about the Saigon sojourn:as you can see from the photographs of the guys on the scooter , they really are barking mad-crossing the road was an adventure that's for sure .
We had half a day looking around the Cu Chi tunnels which were fascinating and made for an interesting comparison with the WW1 trenches we saw last November at Ypres, for here they had similar trenches aswell as the tunnels. The tunnels were on three levels and extended 200km-and they had cunning ways of disposing of all the spoil so as not to give their positions away- dump it in the saigon river , fill in bomb craters with it or pile it high and blow it up with TNT so it looked like a bomb crater!
Incidentally they got the TNT by sawing in half unexploded bombs that the Americans had dropped .
The war museum gave more details of the war and the horrors of agent orange which continues to pass genetic mutations along the generations -evidence of which you still see from time to time as you walk around.
The Vietnamese seem remarkably sanguine about it all -the past is another country so to speak-all the youngsters we met seem to have been trained in tourism at University and were very helpful.
One evening we went to the bar on level 23 of the Sheraton Hotel to watch the lights come on over Saigon . The hotel you see in the lower right of the picture is 'The Rex' the roof top bar is where the American GIs congregated in the war.It was probably a tall building then ,but now is dwarfed by the development around it. We went up to look one evening and they had an old style LA type crooner singing 'Mac the knife'-it was really quite good.
We also sat on the little plastic stools and had a street beer one night with the guys in the photograph-from the sublime to the ridiculous in one evening, and I couldn't say which was more fun!!
The next day we went to the Mekong Delta where I had a close encounter with a large snake as you can see from the photo-I was a bit nervous having just been trying the local snake grappa only an hour earlier that he may have wanted to exact some kind of revenge.
Saigon was too hot for walking around too much and not as interesting as Hanoi-however there were some interesting things to view , and the post office , built by the French was a beautiful building -both inside and outside . There was a map either side as you go in , and a large picture of 'Uncle Ho' at the far end -the maps were beautiful things and it made for a fine post office!
In the end we were glad to escape the claustrophobic heat of the city and flew into Phu Quoc yesterday-as you can see I think Peter Kay has already beaten us to it !
More about Phu Quoc in the next blog-see you all very soon....

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Photos

Health and Safety?
Unbelievable! Threading through Saigon traffic with a sheet of plate glass

Saigon Night scene
View from 23rd floor Sheraton hotel

on the street
Saigon City

Snake poison?
A little bit of what you fancy does you good,but..

Pet Python
Nervous? --do I look nervous?

post office
Map

Special offer Phu Quoc
Peter Kay would love this place!

Phu Quoc Beach
Lynn enjoying the beach

Comments

[Jean]

http://www.iceland-hotels.is
That's one great fun and adventure! Thanks for sharing your photos. By the way, I would like to invite you to Iceland and experience the breathtaking sceneries and activities like kayaking, hiking and midnight golf playing. I have the best Iceland hotels ready for you! Enjoy!