Vietnam (Saigon / Ho Chi Minh City)

The bus was delayed with traffic getting in and took nearly 6 hours to get here from Mui Ne which wasn't the easiest of journeys. The place is booming, so busy with people and scooters, almost all of the pavement is swallowed up by bars, cafes, fast food and other small stalles and shops so that you basically walk on the road. The road itself seems like organised madness, scooters and cars travel on both sides in both directions but amazingly everyone stays calm and we haven't seen any crashes yet unlike in Hanoi. The room we have is probably the worst we have had yet in Vietnam but still not so bad. The bathroom looks and feels like its from the 50's but still functions (just). The room is dirty and noise from the outside bellows in like a large megaphone. We do have a fridge which is always a bonus and the air con is okay, when its working! The first evening we stayed out meeting some Germans and Brits and not getting in 'til gone 2am (not really that late). The culture here seems to be sitting outside and drining on very small chairs, drinking very cheap beer and chatting the night away which is good. I also tried something new, I didn't get the name of it but its basically a steamed duck egg but the baby duck is still inside, not the most attractive food especially to think about but its something new. The taste is like chicken'y boiled egg, I only tried a spoon full and didn't go for the full foetus!

First day we went to get some supplies and izzi took the plunge and had some trousers made for her, not bad for £7, she now resembles a character from Aladdin or just another traveller. We headed out for the day to the War Remnants Museum which documents the American Vietnam war and all its horrors. It has a very one sided and biased view of things but that's what you get used to being in a communist run country. One of the most intersting and disturbing areas was the Agent Orange photography, a toxic chemical which was used by America to destroy vegetation so the Viet Con couldn't hide, causing genetic mutations lasting several generations down the line. There were lots of very interesting and highly emotive scenes and artifacts, my only problem is the one sided approach annoyed me. Obviously America did some pretty awful things but war is brutal and horrific by its nature, regardless of side, type, religion etc. I also know that the Viet Cong did some pretty awful and horrific things which were not shown and given enough attention. All in all a very good museum. We stopped of at a local market for dinner sitting on stools about 6-10 inches from the ground, with a table made of pastic crates and a tray. The food was very good and well worth the £2 we spent on it!

Second day we have booked on to a bus trip to see the Cu Chi tunnels, about 40km outside of Saigon. The tunnels consist of 200km of hand dug tunnels on three levels which were used to fight, live and resist America, quite successfully as well. We got to go down into the tunnels but izzi bottled it half way down and went back up, I don't blame her tbh. At one point I was on all fours crawling through the tunnels in darkness with people in front and behind, I could not see and went straight into someone ass, head first! They were hot and tight, it must have been hellish to stay down there for long periods. They also had been widened for tourists to go down which was incredibly to think they even fit, a common tactic was to boobie trap the tunnels so American soliders would be killed or injured if they came down. At the end of the tour you could visit a firing range and try out some of the weapons which were used in the war. I optened for a magazine of M16 bullets, it was great fun. I have fired shotguns in the past but never a machine gun, quite the powerful beast it was, not sue how good I was but it was fun.

After much deliberation and research we have decided to go to the Mekong Delta for a few day. Tomorrow we leave at 7am by bus to the Mekong travelling through different places and up the Mekong and fianlly through the boarder to Cambodia and into Phnom Penh. We will have done 28 days in Vietnam and travelled from north to south stopping at 9 of the most well known places. Maybe in Cambodia we will go off the beaten track more and see what it has to offer.

Mekong route:
Saigon -> Ben Tre -> Can Tho -> Caig Rang -> Long Xuyen -> Chau Doc -> Phnom Penh (Cambodia)