AspiringNomad

I can’t believe I am already on my last blog entry of Vietnam! I’ve ended my visit to Vietnam in Ho Chi Minh, a crazy city that is saturated with history and thriving with heavy tourism, good weather and a beautiful skyline. I find it hard to understand why it isn’t Vietnams capital as it certainly gives that impression. It’s in your face, loud and unapologetically Vietnamese!

My first experience of Ho Chi Minh probably sums up my trip through this country pretty well as I had to solely rely on the kindness of the Vietnamese people and hope that they truly were just trying to help me and not scam me!
Classically, the bus dropped me off on the side of the road on the outside of the city. At first I didn’t mind, as I was happy to book a Grab taxi for the rest of the journey. As I waited for a Grab driver to accept my ride, the bus driver offered me a seat at the cafe on the roadside. Not him or anyone else at the cafe spoke a word of English so there were a lot of hand gestures and confused faces. After declining a cigarette from him, he took a seat next to me. I simply said ‘No taxi’ as the loading circle on my screen continued to go round and round. He gestured ‘one moment’ to me and went off on his phone and spoke to the other people in the cafe. He soon came back and said ‘motorbike’. Now, I don’t know if you know, but I did the Hai Van Pass and so would consider myself fairly experienced on a moped now, but with 2 backpacks one of which being 16kg I was far from confident that this was going to be safe!
10mins went by and eventually a man turned up. I’m pretty sure it wasn’t the man who the bus driver had contacted as he took some convincing, but after they changed up my big dong notes for me and we put the money in his hand, he accepted the mission.
I put on my useless helmet which didn’t fit, strapped my backpack on and gave the motorist my small one to go between his legs, and with a bit of a wobble, we were off. This man was carelessly flying down the busy streets of Ho Chi Minh, I think he forgot sometimes that I was on the back! Squeezing between cars and other mopeds my body was aching from clinging on so much! But despite this, I was smiling as I got my first glimpse of the huge high rise buildings all lit up with flashing lights and music coming from various street food stands. After 20mins of sheer terror, the man dropped me off about 7mins from the Hostel. I cut my losses after my explanation of where I actually needed to go was completely lost on him and decided to walk the 7mins.
Eventually, I arrived at the hostel in a sweaty state!

My faith in humanity and trust in the kindness of the Vietnamese was rewarded with a free upgrade to a private room with ensuite. With the aircon blaring, I collapsed on the bed and cooled down.
Once feeling a little refreshed, I went to a cafe next door to the hostel for some cheap food and headed back to the room for a good night sleep!

I had booked myself onto the Meykong Delta tour the following day so it was an early start. Before boarding the bus I was introduced to two Argentians, Juan and Ramiro, who were also on the tour from my hostel and we were chatting about where I had visited in their country and where they have visited in England. Turns out that Juan’s cousin is going to study at the UEA next year and it will be her first long distance trip abroad! I sat next to Bassil on the bud who lives in London but is from Abu Dhabi. The tour guide rambled on as we made the two hour journey to the Meykong and thought it was suitable to tell us how much he likes the ‘ladyboy’ shows!
This tour isn’t something I’d recommend to anyone visiting Ho Chi Minh although it had been recommended to me, I felt like the long bus ride either way wasn’t worth it. We spent only a short time actually on the Meykong River and ended up doing various activities inbetween, for example, visiting a factory that makes decorative home wear from wood and all pieces were made by people who have been affected by Agent Orange during the war. We also visited a workshop that explained how to make coconut toffee, of which we were able to sample and I must say, it was delicious! We were then piled onto some small boats through the reeds of an estuary of the Meykong. All of this, I realise, sounds nice but as a group we unanimously agreed that the tour definitely was not what we were expecting!
While chatting to Bassil on the bus on our way home, we realised that we had actually briefly met back in Hoi An! He was a friend of Sid’s and asked me if he could leave his bag with me and the German gang!

Tom had made his way to Ho Chi Minh this day and I met him back in our luxurious private room! Bassil, Tom and I went out for dinner along the Walking Street near out hostel and were joined by Sid who was staying in Ho Chi Minh aswell but was his last night here before heading home.
It’s safe to say, I was not prepared for the Walking Street. Some might say, (Jamie), that it was a feast for the senses but personally I would say it was more of a nightmare for the senses. Complete overload of noise, lights, servers touching you to coax you into their restaurants/bars, smell of hot city air mixed with the sweet smell if alcohol, the only sense given a rest was taste! Nonetheless, it was an experience not to be missed and we eventually found a restaurant fit for dinner. Following our food, we retreated to the air-conditioned room and Bassil made himself so at home that he had a little nap on Tom’s bed!
We soon encouraged him to head out for a drink and Juan and Ramiro joined us at LeFe rooftop bar for a couple of drinks.
They were leaving for Siem Reap the following day so we planned to stay in the same hostel and meet with them there in a couple of days.

On Thursday morning, another tour bought us to the Cu Chi Tunnels of Ho Chi Minh. A must see experience when visiting the capital…oh I mean, city!
It’s about 1.5hrs out from the center and was a great tour! Our guide showed us round the various entrances into the many tunnels that the Vietnamese used to hide from the Americans. Some were just 40cm x 60cm in circumference! We went into one of the tunnels but I only braved going 20meters before coming up for a breath of fresh air. It was very claustrophobic and imagining the Vietnamese spending weeks at a time down there seemed unbearable!

Once we finished the tunnels we were taken to a shooting range next to the tunnels where we could try our hand at shooting a gun of our choice at a target. There were a few choices but I only had one in mind. The AK47 was calling me. Go big or go home, right?! Extremely nervous, I got into position with a professional by side and fired a round of shots at the target. Unsurprisingly, my adrenaline got the better of me and I missed all 10 shots but it was a unusual and exciting experience nonetheless.

The sound of gun fire, the tunnels and the blistering heat gave me just a glimpse of what the Vietnamese had experienced and I felt more sympathy for those caught up in the war than I expected to. Our day ended with a delicious lunch at a nearby restaurant and we then made our way back to the hostel and said goodbye to Bassil who was heading back home after an Indian dinner in Ho Chi Minh.

As it was mine and Toms last night in Vietnam, we decided to go to one of the nice hotels on the Riverside and head up to the top floor as most of them had rooftop bars. The sky line across Ho Chi Minh was beautiful. It is lit up everywhere, LED lights somewhere on every building with big skyscrapers and the river running through the middle. Tim and I discussed our time in Vietnam and pondered over what we would have wanted to have done differently and what we liked most about the place. We agreed that if we had more time we would have wanted to complete the Ha Giang Loop in the north as everyone exclaims that it was the best thing they did in Vietnam, and we gave ourselves a pat on the back for successfully hitting every other main spot in Vietnam without feeling like we were rushing anywhere too much.
After one expensive cocktail and once we had soaked up the view (and I posted some photos on Instagram) we decided to head back to go to bed.

On Friday midday we left the hostel for the last time in Vietnam to head off to Cambodia for the final leg of our trip together.
Vietnam has been amazing. It’s given me the taste for travelling again. The people here are so friendly and the scenery is beautiful. It’s no wonder that it is well travelled, it has every right to be and should be on everyone’s bucket list of places to go!