#Vietnamsouth a quick summary - mainly photographs

We have been back from Vietnam for several weeks now but just wanted to round off with this blog in order to cement memories (it's easy to forget where you have been - ha!)

We get down to Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon). What a shock to the system! After the charm of Hanoi, the quiet of Hue and the relaxed Hoi An - Ho Chi Minh City is a modern international city - certainly at first impressions. The skyline is skyscrapers - all the big banks and telecoms are here. It is a happening place. We didn't spend a lot of time there - but enough to realize that underlying the first impressions is a city of character and underpinned by the same charming Vietnamese people - but the place is definitely more competitive. Time constraints probably meant we did not get the best out of Saigon but there was no hardship leaving.

Arriving Ho Chi Minh City

The Reunification Palace - best known for the scenes in 1975 when Saigon was captured by the Viet Cong

S

In my element with light lunches like this.

From Saigon - like most other tourists we arranged to visit the Mekong Delta - about a 2 hour drive to the eastern side. A bit about the Mekong River and its delta from Wikipaedia.

The Mekong Delta is a network of tributaries in southwest Vietnam, between Ho Chi Minh City and Cambodia. The river itself starts in the Himalayas and passes through China, Myanmar, Thailand and Cambodia before reaching Vietnam, which partly explains why the waters are so murky.

More than half of Vietnam’s rice and fish comes from the delta region, so you can see how vital it is to the Vietnamese economy, diet and Vietnamese culture. Life in the area revolves around water, from the famous floating markets to the vast agricultural industries; a variety of fruits, flowers and livestock grow in the region.

The Mekong delta is massive - and by and large extremely fertile (although it is important to keep the salt water out of course). It is almost entirely a flood plane - ideal for rice growing and for many other crops. The land is topped up by the 160 million tons of sediment - including 6.5 million tons of sand - which is washed down the brown Mekong every year.

By a long way it is Vietnam's most productive agriculture area and it a colourful place - with many things still done as they have been for hundreds of years.

We did a one day tourist package visit - and sad to say we felt like tourists. A visit to a handmade brick works using clay from the delta sediments, a weaving factory, a typical village, a traditional lunch, a bike ride, a canoe ride on the Mekong etc etc. It was fun in a way - but not very satisfying. I think if you want to get the best from the Mekong you need to get deep into it and give it some proper time.  

Brick making the old way using river mud.

Fired by coconut husks

Very brown water - the mud brings fertility to the land.

This river fish formed part of our lunch - but it was a fresh water fish - tasted muddy. 

For our last few days we head two hours south of Ho Chi Minh to the coast - to Vung Tau. To give you an idea of costs in Vietnam - a 2 hour ride in a smart air conditioned taxi costs Rob and I  £10 each. (the roads are excellent and seemed orderly to me).

We have lashed out £30 a night and got ourselves a hotel with a roof top swimming pool. They are so nice and professional. The only down side is it is November but the hotel is in full on Xmas mode - tinsel everywhere and including Christmas trees and naff Christmas music - ha! We get a tan. Vung Tau is quite a big town - a beach resort - but also a large fishing port and I read the main service point for Vietnam's offshore oil rigs. 

Rob in his element - an English breakfast with a knife and fork!