Saigon and the Mekong delta – goodbye to Vietnam

We really liked Saigon, which though not the capital is the largest city and feels a world apart from the rest of Vietnam (we read on another blog that incomes in Saigon are three times the national average; certainly consumerism abounds). We visited the shocking war museum, spent two days exploring the Chinese merchants' quarter (Cholon – see Flickr), had a blind massage (though Zoe was diddled – her masseuse was not properly blind) and finally found the enthusiastic food culture we'd been expecting in Vietnam (pho soup with good cuts of meat and lovely bitter herbs, various sorts of spring rolls, frog*, gorgeous fruit juices).

*Animal-welfare enthusiasts will be horrified to hear we saw frogs in the market that had been skinned and their lips cut off, but that were still alive and tied together in wriggling bunches.

Next we cycled from Saigon across the Mekong delta and into Cambodia over six days, as follows:

• 10th – Saigon to Mytho – 88kms – Vietnamese road behaviour so bad Hannah properly lost it
• 11th – Mytho to Tra Vinh – 70kms – Mekong distributory-hopping via three ferries. Lovely scenery and good food en route
• 12th – Tra Vinh to Can Tho – 93kms – Long but interesting day with a good freshwater fish dinner at the end of it
• 13th – Can Tho to Rach Gia – 116kms – A day to remind us that this is the third world: a 'short-cut' via a 15km bike-trashing sandpit of a road followed by 50kms of continuous beeps and hellos resulted in us arriving after nightfall and foregoing supper in favour of a watermelon in front of the telly at our deserted hotel
• 14th – Rach Gia to Ha Tien – 93kms – The day of a major Asian festival (Mid Autumn), which meant even more people than usual sitting in front of their houses shouting at us
• 15th – Ha Tien to Kampot (Cambodia) – 49kms – Fascinating instant differences over the border: no paved road, even poorer, different-looking but noticeably FEWER people

So to conclude, we loved Vietnam and feel sad that many people who stick to the tourist trail don't experience it as we did. These are a few of the things we'll most remember:

We loved:

• The constant buzz (activity, colour, noise), especially in markets
• The uncynical friendliness of the people
• The visibility and confidence of women, and interesting gender dynamics
  
• Luscious landscapes
• The coffee
• Sugarcane juice
• Filled baguettes
• Buffalos

We had a bit of a love/hate relationship with:

• People constantly staring/ pointing/ shouting/ laughing at us (and occasionally pinching our arms/ cheeks)
  
• The very simple (read: boring) lives many people seemed to be leading (a sure sign of poverty). We spent a lot of time talking about this and trying to resist imposing our own values
  

We didn't like:

• People pulling out without looking. Not some people.. ALL people
• The constant, pointless beeping of motorbikes
• The deafening beeping of buses and lorries
• The fact that people often seemed to copy others' business concept rather than doing something different (e.g. hundreds of identical coffee shops side by side, all empty)
• The fishy smell that hangs around markets
• Bum ache

By the way, we spent on average $44/£25 a day between us in Vietnam (slightly more than expected), though on the Ho Chi Minh Highway (excluding accommodation) we struggled to find opportunities to break a £3 note most days.