Saigon
Trip Start
Jun 29, 2008
1
15
40
Trip End
May 15, 2009
Ho Chi Minh City,
Vietnam
Thursday, July 24, 2008
It's Jo's birthday today so Teresa and I have walked what feels like the whole city trying to find a birthday cake. We have seen loads of cake shops everywhere we have been in Vietnam and now we need one we couldn't find one. We eventually found a coffee shop with a patisserie in it but the cakes were too big for just four of us so we bought some small ones. Camille and Jo have gone off to see some strange religious temple and the famous Cu Chi tunnels were the VC hod out during the war. They hired a private car and tour guide for $84 which was too much for me as I can do it for about $10 with a normal tour. They are going to Siem Reap tomorrow for a couple of days to see Angkor Wat and as I've been and I'm going again in August it seemed stupid to pay $300 to fly there and stay. So I've got the next couple of days to myself exporing the city...I see local food stalls and beer being the order of the days and maybe the tunnels.
Teresa and I we tempted by local fare today as we were on our own and we know that Jo and Camille aren't really up for sitting in the street with locals. We had a sort of soup with think rice noodles, crab, prawns, chicken and pork...it was so nice and $1.50. We were very pleased with ourselves.
Our hotel is nice for $16 a night. We couldn't get into two that we recommended by LP so had to trek around looking for rooms..stressful time with these girls they are not used to it and tempers were beginning to flare. Good job we didn't come from having a long sweaty bus drive!! The one we've got is down a small back alley which didn't look too promising and I could feel the stress levels rising but it is really nice and only a year old with a friendly owner and his wife. We get aircon, hot water, cable TV and free internet (if you can get on the one terminal). A good find in the end.
We are off to the famous Rex hotel tonight for birthday drinks in the roof top bar.....not sure how expensive this is gonna be and good job I had a dress made in Hoi An. The Rex is where the international journalists and war correspondents stayed during the Vietnam war. We've used the loo a couple of times and it is quite nice $200-600 a night! It should be good.
Jo and Camille went to see the Cu Chi Tunnels where the VC lived and fought from during the war and then to see a strange temple. Teresa and I decided to stay behind I couldn't face hot, sweaty, confining tunnels and also they hired a private driver for $85! Teresa wanted to look for a new phone and we also needed to find a birthday cake for Jo. Do you think we could find a cake..everywhere else in Vietnam they are everywhere. We eventually found a coffee shop with cakes and bought a small selection...we didn't want to pig out. We decided that as we were on our own we could go local with our day so we ate at a roadside restaurant on plastic chairs. The menu was in vietnamese so we just pointed at something someone else was eating and had that. It was a sort of soup with pork, chicken, prawns and very slippery wormy like rice noodles. There was also some brown stuff in it that we couldn't identify so we didn't eat it...if it was not in the soup I would have said it was sort of like chocolate but I think it came from an animal. It was really nice though. One we got baqck to near where we were staying we decided to give a Bia Hoi (road side bar with very cheap local beer about 33 cents a glass!!) a go. It wasn't great but was certainly cheap. Iyt started to rain so we decided to have another beer whilst waiting for it to stop. It didn't stop so we had to make a run for it, only trouble was the water was nearly up to our knees!! We were soaked by the time we got back to our GH and the lovely little woman got me a towel so I could dry off a bit. It put a bit of a dampner on our plans as we were late getting back and they were hungry waiting for us. We eventually got out and had a nice meal and a bottle of wine for Jo's birthday before presenting here with the cake and happy birthday sung by a couple of waiters..very funny!! We then headed off to the Rex for our rooftop cocktails which wasn't that expensive. We couldn't have a late night as they were all geading off to Cambodia the next day for a couple of days to see Angkor Wat.
The girls went off leaving me all alone in the city. Which was nice as I could please myself and I didn't have to listen to any griping and moaning. I didn't do much other than mouch around, eating and drinking and loads of people watching. It was heaven. I met an interesting Kiwi woman who has lived in China for the last 4 years teaching. We met up twice over the two days i was on my own.
THe girls got back and we met for lunch and then headed for the airport. Camille, Jo and I back to Bangkok and Teresa back to Melbourne. I arranged to see Teresa again once I get to Oz.
