Free day in Saigon and travel day to Bangkok

• Bbart0012's Profile
• About this blog
• Entry from Bangkok

Trip Start Jun 14, 2008 Previous
Entry Trip End Jul 02, 2008 Next
Entry

  Bangkok, Thailand
Wednesday, July 2, 2008

Where did we leave off?  We had a free day in Ho Chi Mihn City.  Woke up around 7 and ate breakfast around 7 45.  Ended up going to the market around 9 30 or so.  Pretty neat.  Just a big building with anything and everything that you could want.  We walked in and it was in the food section.  They had fresh shrimp and all other kinds of fresh seafood.  A shrimp jumped out of the tub while we were walking by.  Nate and I were both in the market for a new watch, so we walked around a bit and found a place that sells watches.  We both eneded up buying two of them.  I got mine for $55.  I got a Rolex and a Tag Heuer.  I know they are fake but oh well.  After that neither of us had any more money on us, so we went back to the hotel to get some more money and then headed back to the market.  When we got back the only thing that i got for myself was a set of 10 chopsticks in a very nice case.  I bought a few other things for people and we headed back to the hotel.
     On the way back, Dr. Donabaugher asked if we wanted to stop for a beer, Nate and I couldn't disagree, so we stopped at the old officers club during the war for a beer.  She ended up buying beers for us, once again couldn't argue that.  After that we went back to the room and decided to get massages.  Apparently my person was better than nates, but neither of us were very impressed.  Took a quick nap after that and started to get some stuff packed up for travelling.  Jen decided that she was going to take 1 suitcase  back for us so we could lighten our load to thailand.  Very nice of her. 
     For dinner Palmer paid for our last dinner and we went to this hotel called legends and got the buffet there.  It had anything and everything you could possibly want(just like the market).  I at a ton of sushi and ordered an argentinian ribeye(nothing like back home).  After that a small group of us went back to the Lion brewery.  We all got Liters again, then we said our goodbyes to everyone that had to leave the hotel at 4 30. 
    Nate and i got up around 6 30 because we wanted to leave the hotel by 8 to get to the airport.  We didn't know how traffic would be in Saigon so just to make sure we wanted to get to the airport early.  We got a cab and it took about 45 min. to get to the airport.  We got to the gate about 1 1/2 hours before our flight, so i guess we didn't have to leave so early, but better safe than sorry.  After all the run around and switching gates in the airport, we got on the flight and it only took off about 40 min. late.  We think that in vietnam they shouldn't put times on the flights they should put 11 40ish, because they NEVER leave on time. 
    ON the way here, we were in decent for Bangkok and hit a huge wall cloud and had the worst turbulance i've ever been in.  We prolly dropped about 200 feet in about 1-2 seconds.  then jerked side from side pretty good.  after that little 10 second bout everything was fine.  We got through customs and our baggage got here fine.  On the way out, we were talked to about the taxi by some "official" taxi service.  It ended up costing us $40 to get to the hostel and we rolled up in a BMW.  Kinda ironic, going to a hostel and getting there in a BMW.  After we got our room at the hostel, which by the way, isn't as bad as i thought it would be, nate and i decided to explore some.  Our hostel is close to a pretty happening district of town.  We scoped out a few places to eat and a few irish and english pubs to check out while we are here. 
     So now we are gonna head out to get some real Thai food in Thailand!  Can't wait!  Well that's about it for now.  We are going up to the Grand palace area to see some temples and what not tomorrow, so tomorrows blog should be pretty decent.  Talk to you all again soon!

Print this entry Share

Previous Entry Next Entry