We confirmed the trip to the Mekong delta with the travel desk about 7:30 AM and were down and ready to go by 9. It was our old buddy Binh and another Rex hotel chariot of the Toyota Camry version. We were given a brief rundown of timings ...
- 1.5 hours or so to get to the river
- 2.5 hours or so on the river with lunch
- 2 hours or so to get home
Sounds good :) and we are off. We were told there is a spanking new super highway to get to our destination. The driver checked the traffic on the new thoroughfare using his cell and we ended up on some older but not so congested route. We drove for close to 2 hours and the traffic at times was heavy. The congestion was aggravated by motorcycles everywhere, dodging in and out of the vehicular traffic at a feverish pace. They were all shapes and sizes and we did end up seeing 4 on one bike, our present day HCM record so far. The roads, though mostly secondary, were just fine and nothing like the pothole-erama I encountered in Uganda.
The first stop was ... guess ... a pagoda. This one had a 100 foot high set of buddhas, one smiling and one more serious. The grounds were quite palatial and the courtyards quite magnificent. It was a nice start for a great journey.
Back in the car, in about 15 minutes, we pulled into a busy marine landing terminal, happily occupied by a multitude of tourists such as ourselves. Binh disappeared to do the required ticket purchase and ST bought a new cloth cap with a wide/low brim, just what one needs for this climate. We ventured out across the Mekong on a bateau that could have easily accommodated 50 people ... just the two of us, Binh, and the pilot.
We landed on the far side and walked a bit through heavy vegetation into a small cafe for tea. The tea was made with a free-flowing honey and accompanied by papaya pieces, some fried banana, candied clustered peanuts, and sugared ginger finger delicacies. Then the "pushing s__t" started as packages of all the tidbits appeared with hope that we would purchase. We bought some of the peanuts and headed out of the cafe to our next adventure ... row boat rides through the Mekong jungle. The channel we traversed in the row boat was very busy with boat loads of eager tourists such as us, and we were overwhelmed by the heavy traffic. We were given Vietnamese lamp shade hats to wear and I found out the second reason why they are so popular here ... they sit low on your head and protect your face from low-lying vegetation that could scrape and/or cut one's face :). After about 20 minutes in these narrow estuary-like channels off the main Mekong river, we boarded the boat again for a short trip to our next item of entertainment.
We found ourselves in another cafe with a few other tables occupied by customers. Fruits appeared, some which we did not recognize or end up liking. The papaya was great as was the pineapple that was dipped, if one were so inclined, in a chili pepper and sugar mixture on the way to one's mouth. There was a set of singers accompanied by three musicians with stringed instruments all the way from one to six strings. We left there 4 USD lighter and happy.
We climbed into a wagon being pulled by a single horse, and ventured into a settlement just down the road. We discovered we were actually back on the mainland, just on the other side of the river from where we had left. The town had many pedestrians and next to no vehicular traffic. It was very rural compared to HCM of course and some other little bergs we had seen all day while driving. Sweet Thing caught the head and a bit of the shoulders of a water buffalo submerged in a stream just at the same spot where we said goodbye to the horse and headed back to the boat. This animal bathing was highlight of the day in pictures.
Back on the mainland, we met the driver and headed off for lunch which was a pleasant adventure into traditional food land. We had local vegetables on shrimp chips, a potato and rice cake that resembled a bread roll, some fish battered on sticks, then the main course. We were given vegetables, vermicelli, and a few sauces to wrap inside rice paper like makeshift spring rolls. A deep fried fish standing up supported by some thin wood infrastructure was the heart of the main course. I am not sure what kind of fish it was but it was reminiscent of the talapia I had many times in Ethiopia. Making our own spring rolls reminded me of a plan Kramer and Poppie had to open a restaurant where the clientele made their own pizza. That never got off the ground; when Poppie found out Kramer would allow the customers to put cucumber on their pizzas he hit the roof.
Back at the Rex we crashed and about 6:10 ST woke up and exclaimed we should get up so we can sleep tonight. We spoke with the front desk about an Italian place or two and ended up at something called Al Fresco near the Sheraton. ST had chicken parmigiana and I a salad which I could not finish. We then walked in the direction of the hotel and ended up cruising some of the streets around the Rex as well as the outdoor night time market once again. Shop-keepers would touch our arm and say "t-shirt miss/sir" hoping their invasion would stir one to buy. We made it back to the hotel with plans for tomorrow to see the Cu Chi tunnels, some 60km from the city and spend the afternoon to ourselves.
I learned an interesting item about driving in Vietnam. We would be moving along a road with a concrete barrier between opposing lanes, and the driver would put on his left turn signal (we were in the outside lane at the time). I finally figured out it was the way to signal a vehicle in front to move over so one could pass.
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