Saturday – Sunday, March 9 – 10
The flight from JFK to Seoul Incheon airport took about 14
hours, however we slept through most of it. When we landed in Seoul, it was
just after 5 am local time, and everything was closed. We found Starbucks and
relaxed a bit, and then went for a nice breakfast of poke and tonkatsu once food
court restaurants started opening. Afterwards, on the way to our gate, Sofia
bought lots of Korean beauty skincare products, getting a very good deal.
The flight from Seoul to Hanoi was a bit over 4 hours but
felt longer. We cleared passport control very quickly with our e-visas and
caught our luggage. The driver was waiting for us outside and took us to our
hotel called O’Gallery Majestic. Everyone at hotel reception was very friendly
and welcoming, and our portable Wi-Fi device was delivered to front desk as
promised. The hotel was located close to the Old Quarter, so after taking a
quick shower we went out to explore.
It’s necessary to mention that Hanoi is not really a
pedestrian friendly city. There are scooters and motorbikes zooming all over
the place, even driving onto sidewalks. Those sidewalks are narrow and
partially blocked by parked motorbikes. So walking was somewhat slow and
crossing streets required an element of courage. After walking around a bit, we
stopped at a cute place called Balcony Café for Vietnamese coffee. Sofia had
iced coffee with condensed milk and coconut sorbet, and I had traditional hot
coffee with condensed milk on the bottom.
Feeling re-energized, we went for a walk around Hoan Kiem
Lake and visited Ngoc Son Temple. According to a King Arthur like legend, in
the mid-15th century Heaven sent Emperor Ly Thai To a magical sword, which he
used to drive Chinese from Vietnam. After the war a giant golden turtle grabbed
the sword and disappeared into the lake to restore the sword to its divine
owners, inspiring the name Ho Hoan Kiem (Lake of the Restored Sword). Ngoc Son
Temple sits on a small island in the northern part of Hoan Kiem Lake, connected
to the lakeshore by an elegant red wooden bridge. This temple was dedicated to
General Tran Hung Dao, who defeated Kublai Khan’s Mongol forces in the 13th
century. As I learned from our guidebook on the flight over, Vietnamese had a
long history of defeating all kinds of invaders throughout centuries, and they
are very proud of it.
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| Hoan Kiem Lake |
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| Ngoc Son Temple |
After visiting the temple, we continued walking around the
lake and looked at some old crumbling French style buildings in the French
Quarter. Then we went for an early dinner at a restaurant called G-Crab.
Despite being highly rated on TripAdvisor, the food was just ok although Hanoi
beer felt light and refreshing. Afterwards, we went for an hour-long Thai
massage at Noble Spa which was just what we needed after 2 long flights. And
then we walked back to our hotel and wrapped up this super-long day.
Monday, March 11
This morning after breakfast, we met our guide and driver
for the day. First we drove to visit Temple of Literature – a Confucian temple
built in 1070, which was also where first university in Vietnam was established
in 1076. It was very crowded with groups of little but noisy school kids on
class trips. Then we visited West Lake and Truc Bach Lake. The latter was just
a small lake separated from West Lake by a narrow causeway. Its claim to fame is
that John McCain landed there after his plane was shot down over Hanoi in 1967.
West Lake itself was large, nice and calm, with a tall orange Tran Quoc Pagoda
on its shore. Then we drove towards Old Quarter and went for pre-arranged
included lunch which left much to be desired. The street food we grabbed
afterwards – fried pancake with seafood – had considerably more flavor.
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| West Lake - Tran Quoc Pagoda |
Old Quarter was much less crowded today, but still a chaotic
mess of narrow streets, people, scooters, motorbikes and honking horns. Our
guide took us on a walking tour through some shopping streets, and to a local
wholesale market selling trinkets in bulk. Then we visited Ngoc Son Temple and Hoan
Kiem Lake, this time with a guide, who told us the now-familiar story of the
magic sword. After that, we drove to visit Ho Chi Minh mausoleum and caught the
changing of ceremonial guards in white uniforms with SKS rifles and bayonets. The mausoleum and overall layout of the square was very familiar, following
Moscow’s Red Square model on a smaller scale. The entrance to mausoleum was
closed as it is every Monday and Friday, so we just saw it from the outside. Then
we looked at impressive and unique One Pillar Pagoda, built of wood on a single
stone pillar.
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| Changing of the guard |
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| One Pillar Pagoda |
Finally we drove back towards our hotel, asking our guide to drop
us off at a small park with a statue of somewhat Vietnamese-looking Lenin
nearby. We snapped a couple of pictures and then went for coffee across the
road. The coffee shop was right next to the Military History Museum, and we posed
for pictures in front of a MIG-21 fighter plane and T-54 tank in the courtyard.
Returning to the hotel, I went for a nap and woke up just in
time for dinner. We had a reservation at a new restaurant called Chestnut only
0.3 miles nearby. The restaurant had a nice rooftop deck bar with great drinks,
although the view was somewhat hazy due to air pollution. The food was quite
good – fresh and fried spring rolls, green mango salad, duck in pumpkin, and
beef rolled in betel leaves – but the service felt artificially too nice,
almost forced. After dinner we returned to our hotel, finished packing, and
went to sleep.
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| Spring Rolls at Chestnut |
Tuesday, March 12
This morning we are leaving Hanoi for our Halong Bay cruise.
It was good to get away from the motorbikes and polluted city air. However, our
Majestic O’Gallery hotel was nicely decorated and very comfortable. Hotel manager
Brian sent us off with warm goodbyes and a request for a 5-star TripAdvisor
review. The driver picked us up at 8:30 am. The highway north felt new and the traffic
was light. We saw nice green fields, cows, and water buffalo on the way. We
arrived to the cruise port 2 hours before our scheduled departure time and had
to reluctantly wait in a comfortable outside courtyard. At around 12:30 pm we
loaded into a small boat and got to our Perla Dawn ship, where we had a pretty
good lunch with steamed curry fish and fried rice.
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| Halong Bay |
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| Our ship - Perla Dawn Sails |
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| More views of Halong Bay |
The boat had space for 60 passengers and was only 60% full.
The cabins are pretty spacious with good size bathrooms, big picture windows
and balconies. Big green hills and limestone mountains crowded the bay on all
sides. The sun came out and we relaxed on the sun deck for a while, enjoying
the scenery. After that, we took the small boat for a tour of the caves. At a
floating platform surrounded by rocky cliffs, we switched to a shaky bamboo
boat driven by a very loud girl. She paddled our boat through a big cave with
stalactites precariously hanging over our head, all the while talking to other
boat handlers nearby. The views were nice, but the water felt cold and the wind
felt chilly as well. So we decided against going for a swim and had a beer on
the top deck instead.
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| Boat tour of the caves |
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| Back on the ship |
We were promised dinner on a floating fish farm nearby, but
the plans were abruptly switched due to “rain, cold, and wind”. It was indeed
chilly, but pretty calm and no rain in the forecast, so we felt disappointed.
The dinner on the boat was ok, fairly simple and a bit too drawn out. Well, and
that’s why we don’t normally go on cruises. After dinner we unsuccessfully
tried to catch octopus flashing the light into the water and attracting small
fish, enjoyed night scenery a bit, and went to sleep.
Wednesday, March 13
This morning we woke up early and went up on the sun deck of
our ship. There was no sun yet and the surrounding scenery of Halong Bay with
its limestone hills rising up from the water looked especially mysterious in
the morning haze. After a quick breakfast, we loaded up on the boat for a short
ride to a floating fish farm. People who live there raise fish, shrimp, oysters
and clams for sale. We got into a double kayak and spent the next hour or so
paddling around the area, looking at the karst cliffs and floating fish farms.
Then we loaded back on the boat and returned to Perla Dawn. Took a shower,
packed our bags, and went upstairs for a spring roll making demo followed by a
light lunch.
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| Floating fish farm |
We got back to the shore in Haiphong around noon, met our
driver, and quickly called Ms. Ha to figure out whether we have enough time to
swing by Hanoi instead of going straight to the airport. Plans successfully
adjusted, we got back to O’Gallery Majestic around 2:00 pm and were greeted by
manager Brian and his friendly staff. We stored our suitcases and went to the
Military History Museum nearby, stopping for coffee on the way. We spent about 1.5
hours looking at various artifacts from Vietnam’s many conflicts, from early
wars against Chinese and Mongols to more recent French and American wars. Museum’s
inner courtyard housed an impressive collection of aircraft, tanks, cannons,
and other hardware. In the center there was a modern art like installation made
from a wreckage of a French warplane. Then we climbed Hanoi Tower and looked at
the same view from above.
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| Wreckage art |
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| View from Hanoi Tower |
I have to say that Hanoi started growing on me. Before
coming here, I expected drab cookie-cutter Soviet-style buildings, similar to
what we saw in Beijing city center. However, there was none of that here. Hanoi
certainly has a lot of character, with its old French style buildings, jumble
of narrow streets in the old town, and bustle of little shops and restaurants.
They just need to install some traffic lights and stop motorbikes from parking
and sometimes driving on sidewalks.
We got back to the hotel right before 4:00 pm and met our
driver. The ride to the airport took less time than expected – only 35 minutes.
We quickly checked in for our flight to Da Nang and went for a snack of banh mi
and spring rolls with Tiger beer. Our flight was on time and we got to Da Nang
around 7:45 pm. Met our driver and got to our hotel – Palm Garden Resort in Hoi
An – by 8:30 pm. The hotel is located on Cua Dai beach and has a big pool and
nicely landscaped grounds. It was already dark when we got there, so we
explored the surroundings a bit and went to sleep.
Thursday, March 14
Today we had a half-day guided tour of My Son valley. This was
the religious center of Champa kingdom between 2nd and 10th
centuries. Champa were Indian-like people who practiced Hindu religion and used
Sanskrit writing. They built a number of Hindu shrines using some stone and
mostly brick, with special waterproofing techniques that kept those bricks
surprisingly well preserved to this day. Unfortunately, most of the temples
were almost completely destroyed by American air strikes because Viet Cong used
the area as a refuge during the war.
The drive from our hotel took about an hour, and then we
spent some time exploring the ruins of Cham towers. It was very green, foggy
and misty, making the place look even more mysterious. Then we watched about 10
minutes of fake folklore song and dance performance and headed back to Hoi An.
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| My Son valley |
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| My Son valley |
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| My Son valley |
For lunch we stopped at an organic farm in Tra Que village. We
had a brief and very rudimentary cooking lesson, which consisted of stir-frying
already pre-cut pork and shrimp and tying them and a bunch of herbs with a
sprig of scallion. Then we had a fairy unremarkable and unnecessarily slow
lunch and drove back to our hotel.
In the afternoon, sun came out and we spent some time on the
beach in front of our hotel. I went for a swim and then we took a nice long
walk on the beach. It was not crowded but there were some people enjoying the
sunshine. There were some medium sized and small hotels and beach bars scattered
all along this stretch of the beach, somewhat reminiscent of Seven Mile Beach
in Grand Cayman. It almost felt like home…
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| Hoi An - Palm Garden Resort |
For dinner we went to a restaurant across the street from
our hotel, called Golden Nut. It was located right next to other restaurants
such as Golden Lotus and Golden Fish, however unlike those, Golden Nut was
highly rated on TripAdvisor. The service was friendly and the food was good,
but sort of simple, almost like Americanized Chinese food. We were starting to wonder
what all the hype was about regarding Vietnamese cuisine, and whether one could
really trust TripAdvisor around here. After dinner, we stopped in a tailor shop
next door and Sofia convinced me to order four custom made-to-measure shirts at
$25 each. While crossing the road back to our hotel, we saw a couple of lost
lonely cows munching grass on the divider. Hopefully they will find their way
back across.
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| Hoi An - cows on highway divider |
Friday, March 15
Finally, a free day – no guided tours today! We liked our guides
well enough so far, but it’s nice to be on our own schedule for a change. So
after a quick breakfast, we took a taxi to the old town of Hoi An about 10
minutes away. This town was first an important Champa kingdom port, and later a
trading outpost of Japanese and Chinese merchants. It had a number of
well-preserved temples and old merchant houses, as well as a classic Japanese
covered wooden bridge built in the 1590s. It also had a number of souvenir and clothing
shops, both selling ready made clothes and tailoring to order.
We strolled through town, visited a few temples, merchant
guild assembly halls, and historical houses, as well as the covered bridge. Not
wanting to rely solely on reviews, we also tried to look at some restaurant
menus to scout out a place for dinner. The walk along the river was especially
nice, although it started getting hot. We bought a little silver tiger pendant
for Sofia and a dragon pendant for me, and Sofia also bought a dress. For lunch
we grabbed banh mi sandwiches at a little hole-in-the-wall Phi Banh Mi sandwich
shop, and took a taxi back to our hotel.
Then we changed into swimsuits and took a taxi to An Bang
beach only 1.5 km away. This beach was crowded mostly with Asian and European
tourists, but the water was warm and calm. We went for a swim a couple of times
and spent 2-3 hours relaxing on the beach. Then we grabbed a taxi back and
stopped by the tailor shop to try my shirts, which were too loose. We left
instructions to take them in, promised to return later in the evening, and went
to relax on the beach in front of our hotel.
For dinner we went back to Hoi An old town, to a place
called Morning Glory which we saw earlier in the morning. It had an interesting
menu, with an innovative twist on traditional Vietnamese food. Sofia had a
whole deep-fried snapper and I had squid stuffed with pork. The food was
excellent and we also had a nice table outside on the balcony, overlooking the
street. It was Friday night, so it seems a lot of local families with kids were
out, in addition to all the tourists. There were lots of bright and colorful
paper lanterns lit, creating a festive atmosphere. After dinner, we walked
around a bit more, grabbed a shuttle back to our hotel, picked up my shirts,
and went to sleep.
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| Hoi An - Morning Glory Restaurant - deep-fried snapper |
Saturday, March 16
Our guide Nam met us at 8:00 am and we started our drive
north. Our first stop was at the Marble Mountains – five marble hills topped
with pagodas. Each mountain is named for the natural element it represents,
with only Thuy Son (Water) open to visitors. We explored a few natural caves in
which first Hindu and later Buddhist sanctuaries have been built over the centuries.
Like most places in Vietnam, these hills haven’t escaped the war. Viet Cong had
a field hospital in these caves, and they were rocketed by US helicopters,
adding a few openings for more natural light and improved ventilation. Then we
stopped by a marble souvenir factory and bought a little Happy Buddha figurine
made out of pink quartz.
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| At Marble Mountains |
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| Marble Mountains |
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| Marble Mountains cave |
Continuing our drive north, we passed through Danang
waterfront. The area is booming with development, with many luxury hotels,
resorts, and villas under construction. We drove by a construction site called
CocoBay that’s supposed to become the Las Vegas of Vietnam when complete.
Apparently, Cristiano Ronaldo has invested… The property ownership laws for
foreigners in Vietnam aren’t entirely clear to me, but perhaps worth looking
into.
North of Danang, we stopped at Linh Ung – a very tall Buddha
statue positioned on a lotus-shaped platform facing south to Danang city. Then
we got back on the road which soon started climbing towards Hai Van pass
through a mountain range that juts out into the sea. The elevation was only
496m, so not all that high, however the ocean views from the serpentine were
spectacular.
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| Linh Ung Buddha |
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| At Linh Ung |
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| View of Danang skyline from Linh Ung |
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| View from Hai Van pass |
Descending the mountain on the northern side, we stopped for
lunch at Be Than, a seafood restaurant in a fishing village. The place was busy
with local families, so clearly not a tourist trap. We asked our guide to get
us the menu, instead of sticking with the set pre-ordered by our local travel
agent, and ordered squid, shrimp, oysters, and seafood fried rice. Then we also
ordered green papaya seafood salad, which wasn’t on the English menu but looked
good on the table next to ours. The food was delicious and the setting right on
the water was absolutely perfect.
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| Seafood lunch feast at Be Than |
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| View from Be Than |
Feeling full and happy after lunch, we got back in the car
and arrived to Hue in another hour or so. Our hotel – Indochina Palace – was
huge and fairly new, built only 7 years prior. We got upgraded to a larger
room, which had a weird layout and heavy old-fashioned furniture and décor. We
spent a couple of hours relaxing by the pool in the shade, and went out in
search of dinner. We weren’t really hungry yet after that big lunch, so we
explored the walking area downtown – a few streets closed to cars and
motorbikes, with lots of bars, restaurants, and shops. We peeked into the
famous military-themed bar called DMZ, but it didn’t seem all that interesting.
Perhaps because it was Saturday night, the streets and drinking establishments
were packed with a mix of locals and tourists. We walked around a bit and went
for dinner to a place called Golden Rice which had an interesting menu – same
as Elegant Restaurant where we initially wanted to go but which was all booked
up. I had caramelized pork ribs and Sofia had catfish baked in clay pot. After
dinner we walked along the river and visited an amazing XQ Embroidery Museum
nearby, before taking a taxi back to our hotel.
Sunday, March 17
Late start today – we met our guide at 9:00 am and drove out
of city center to visit Khai Dinh tomb. Hue used to be Vietnam’s capital until
1945, so it has the old Imperial Palace and several royal tombs. Khai Dinh of
the Nguyen dynasty was the penultimate emperor of Vietnam, ruling from 1916 to
1925 under close supervision of French colonial administration. His son – the
last emperor – spent most of his life in France, abdicated the throne in 1945
passing the reins to Ho Chi Minh, returned to France and died there in 1997. Anyway,
Khai Dinh’s tomb was a huge ostentatious structure built with a mix of Western
and traditional Vietnamese styles. Mostly concrete on the outside, it had many
colorful detailed mosaics inside. The whole project took 11 years to complete,
and included multiple monuments, temples and other pavilions in addition to the
tomb itself.
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| At Khai Dinh tomb |
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| At Khai Dinh tomb |
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| At Khai Dinh tomb |
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| At Khai Dinh tomb |
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| At Khai Dinh tomb |
Afterwards, we drove to visit the Tu Duc royal tomb. This
tomb was built between 1864 and 1867. Emperor Tu Duc designed it himself to use
before and after his death. The complex included temples, ponds, wooden
pavilions reminiscent of Japanese tea houses, living quarters, and a theater.
It’s said the emperor often retreated here to work, relax, and entertain away
from his court and his 100+ wives and concubines in Hue. The tomb itself was
very simple and serene, surrounded by tall pines.
Getting back on the road, we crossed the Perfume River and stopped
at Thien Mu Pagoda. This octagonal pagoda was originally founded in 1601, with
some of the adjacent buildings added later. One little pavilion contained a
huge bronze bell cast in 1710. The main building housed an interesting shiny
statue of laughing happy Buddha. There’s also a Buddhist monastery on site, and
we saw monks’ daily schedule. They get up at 3:30 am and do exercises – written
as Cong Phu – for an hour in the morning and another hour in the afternoon.
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| At Thien Mu Pagoda |
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| At Thien Mu Pagoda |
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| At Thien Mu Pagoda |
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| At Thien Mu Pagoda |
Then we went for a set menu lunch at a restaurant next to
the Citadel, where we sat in the courtyard and were served spring rolls on
skewers stuck into pineapple shell made to look like a rooster.
After lunch, we
toured the Imperial Palace, which was a castle within the larger walled
Citadel. The palace grounds included several distinct temples, gardens, theater,
and palaces – for the emperor, empress, queen mother, as well as so-called
Forbidden Purple City for imperial concubines. Most of the buildings here were
destroyed during French and American wars. Some were restored, some are
undergoing restoration now, and some are just foundations overgrown with weeds.
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| Imperial Palace entrance |
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| At Imperial Palace |
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| At Imperial Palace |
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| At Imperial Palace |
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| At Imperial Palace |
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| At Imperial Palace |
Getting back to our hotel, we had Vietnamese coffee in the
lounge and relaxed a bit, observing the preparations for a wedding. They closed
the pool for the day and built a walkway across, with stage lighting,
decorations, and enough tables for a few hundred guests. After a long day outside
in the heat, we decided to take it easy and stayed on the terrace overlooking
the pool, having drinks and dinner there and observing the wedding. It was an
elaborate affair, with lights, stage smoke, and singing. However, the whole
thing was over by 7:30 pm. No dancing, no wild partying… we were almost
disappointed by such limited entertainment. Maybe there was an after party
somewhere, but we weren’t invited.
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| Wedding at our hotel in Hue |
Monday, March 18
Woke up at 5:30 am, had a quick breakfast, and went to the
airport for our 8:35 am flight to Ho Chi Minh city, a.k.a. Saigon. The flight
was on time and we got to Saigon airport around 9:45 am. Caught our luggage and
met our guide Nhung and driver Zoom (definitely wrong spelling, but a good name
for a driver). The plan was to go to Cu Chi Tunnels about 2 hours drive away, afterwards
have pre-planned lunch in that area, and then return to Saigon to explore a few
city sights. However, we weren’t all that keen on that pre-ordered lunch idea,
especially after our guide confirmed that the place is not great, because all
restaurants around Cu Chi area are geared to serving tourists. Plus, if we hit
traffic on the way back, we may not get to Saigon until after former
Presidential Palace closes. So, we decided to skip lunch, do all of the
sightseeing first, and then go to the best banh mi place in Saigon.
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| Cu Chi tunnels - Viet Cong trap |
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| Cu Chi tunnels |
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| Cu Chi tunnels |
First we explored Cu Chi tunnels at Ben Dinh. Here, VietCong
guerrillas lived in underground bunkers connected by a network of tunnels and
used them to attack American troops, who unwittingly built a base almost on top
of these tunnels. We watched a short documentary extolling the heroism of
Vietnamese people in their struggle against American aggression. Propaganda
aside, it was quite impressive even to us, brought up on Russian military lore
from World War 2. We saw scary-looking traps made from fragments of American
bombs and shells, makeshifts weapons, and ingenious tactics used by VC to
counter far superior firepower of American army. Sofia didn’t feel like descending
into dark stuffy tunnel, so I went with the guide through a section where you
could walk bending pretty low. Even I decided to skip the section where
crawling may be required. We looked at other parts of the exhibit – fire bunker,
kitchen, command post, and a workshop for making sandals from fragments of
American tires. We declined the offer to visit the adjacent shooting range,
operated by the army and supposedly very expensive. Instead, we got on the road
and drove back to Saigon.
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| Former Presidential Palace |
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| At former Presidential Palace |
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| At former Presidential Palace |
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| At former Presidential Palace |
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| Former Presidential Palace kitchen |
We got to the former Presidential Palace around 2:30 pm,
with plenty of time to explore. The original building was erected here in 1868 for
French colonial governor, in the opulent style with materials imported from
France. When the French left Vietnam after their defeat at Dien Bien Phu, the
building became the official residence of South Vietnamese president Ngo Dinh
Diem. However, most of it was destroyed in 1962, when Diem’s own air force
bombed the palace in a failed assassination attempt. The new building
constructed in modernist style and designed by a Vietnamese architect was
completed in 1966, long after Diem’s military finally succeeded in killing him
in 1963. The new building was called Independence Palace. It was renamed
Reunification Palace after North Vietnamese Communist forces took Saigon in
1975. It still houses government offices, with only parts of the building open
to public. We explored several meeting and reception rooms, former Presidential
living quarters and courtyard garden, as well as entertainment rooms. In the
basement, there were communication rooms with old radio and telex equipment. We
watched a great video, surprisingly devoid of propaganda, describing the
history of the building and its various occupants. Outside, the two tanks that
symbolically crashed the gates in 1975 were unfortunately for us covered up for
restoration, to prepare for reunification anniversary.
After the Palace, we took a quick drive to Norte Dame
cathedral, which we could only see from the outside since it was also being
restored. Across the street, there was a very nice Old Saigon Post Office
building, and we spent a few minutes exploring it and taking pictures. Our
guide Nhung also pointed out the building a bit further away that was featured
in the iconic fall of Saigon photo of the last American chopper taking off its
roof. I always thought it was the US embassy, but it was actually a CIA
station.
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| Old Saigon Post Office |
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| Old Saigon Post Office |
And then it was time for our long-awaited lunch at Banh Mi
Huynh Hoa. The sandwiches were awesome, with lots of fillings including
homemade pate, various sausage slices, herbs, and chilies. Even Sofia who is
generally impartial to sandwiches finished hers. While eating banh mi, we got
to our Grand Silverland hotel, checked in, had coffee and went to look at the
nearby market. We walked around, bought some Vietnamese coffee beans and a
couple of souvenirs, and returned to our hotel to relax a bit. For dinner we
went to Secret Garden restaurant mentioned in our Lonely Planet guide and
fairly highly rated online. It turned out to be a disappointment – too crowded
with tourists, with chaotic service – and on top of everything they ran out of
catfish that Sofia ordered. My pork with coconut was decent, but really not up
to the hype… the food would probably be tastier at the street market. At least
there was live entertainment – a rooster in a cage and two monochromatic cats nosing
around. After dinner, we strolled towards the hotel and stopped by a bar called
Warning Zone that advertised Tiger Crystal beer I wanted to try. We sat on
little chairs on the sidewalk just like the locals do and slowly drank our
Tiger Crystal while watching people go by. The beer was very light and
refreshing, with a nice flavor. A perfect end to a long day.
Tuesday, March 19
After breakfast, our guide and driver picked us up at 9:00
am for the tour of Mekong delta. We drove south-west for about two hours and
then got on our private boat in the village of Cai Be located on the upper branch
of the Mekong River. We enjoyed the trip downriver, stopping on the way to
visit local houses and workshops for making coconut candy, rice paper, pop
rice, and rice whiskey with snake inside. I even got to handle a phlegmatic
python, which was surprisingly heavy. As we continued on, I took a nice nap in
a hammock on the boat. We had pre-arranged lunch, which was quite tasty and artfully
presented, in a small local restaurant surrounded by fruit gardens.
Then we had a boat ride in a little rowboat through small
canals, transferred back to our original boat, and continued downriver. I was
certainly happy we weren’t going upriver looking for Kurtz. Anyway, we got to Vinh
Long around 2 pm and went shopping at the local market, where we bought some
mangoes, lychees, and dried squid. Afterwards we connected with our driver and
continued on to Can Tho, the capital of Mekong Delta.
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| At local market |
Our hotel Vinpearl Can Tho was only a couple of years old
and very nicely appointed. We got a room on the 28th floor with a
beautiful view of Mekong River and city below. After relaxing at the outdoor
pool for about an hour, we headed for dinner to the seafood restaurant Nhung
recommended, called Hai San Bien Dong. It was a huge place mostly outdoors,
with big tanks teeming with live fish, shrimp, lobsters, oysters, and other sea
creatures. We hit a minor snag as they didn’t have an English menu and spoke
almost no English. We understood that we could pick live “ingredients” from the
tanks by pointing, but it would be nice to know how they’d be prepared. After
struggling a bit, one of the ladies working there found pictures of cooked
dishes on her phone, and we were in business. We ordered grilled oysters with
garlic and cheese, grilled scallops with BBQ sauce, marinated grilled squid, big
shrimps grilled with garlic, and garlic fried rice. A couple of shrimp tried to
escape by jumping out of the bucket, but were quickly caught and subdued. Oh,
and there was plenty of Tiger Crystal beer served by a local Heineken beer girl.
The food was amazing, especially the squid which was spicy and citrusy all at
once. We ate too much and took a taxi back to our hotel through brightly
illuminated streets of Can Tho.
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| Dinner at Hai San Bien Dong |
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| Dinner at Hai San Bien Dong |
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| Dinner at Hai San Bien Dong |
Wednesday, March 20
Early start today – rolled out of the hotel at 7:30 am and
drove a short distance to the boat dock. Got into our private boat and
navigated up lower branch of Mekong River, past Vinpearl Hotel and to the
largest floating market in Vietnam. It was a very interesting and exotic sight
– boats serving as floating shops selling every kind of local fruits and
vegetables – pineapples, mangoes, watermelons, rambutans, onions, sweet
potatoes, cabbages, and so on. This was a wholesale market and as our guide
told us, these merchants buy from farmers and resell to small retailers. We
could see brisk commerce in action, with people moving a bunch of watermelons
from one boat to another, little floating cafes selling coffee and banh mi, and
lots of other activity. After navigating the entire length of this market, we
turned around and went back downstream. After getting back to the dock, we
spent a bit of time shopping for souvenirs, and had Vietnamese coffee with
condensed milk. Then we drove to Can Tho airport, said goodbye to Nhung and
Zoom, and flew a midsize turboprop to Phu Quoc Island.
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| Back on the river - Vinpearl Hotel |
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| At the floating market |
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| Floating gas station |
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| At the floating market |
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| At the floating market |
Landing at Phu Quoc, we were met by a shuttle from our hotel
La Veranda. Got to the hotel, checked in, and went to explore the beach. It was
around 3:00 pm and the water was ridiculously warm and calm. We went for a swim
and a snack at a beachside bar near our hotel, and then for another swim.
Afterwards, I tried to find a stand-up paddle board rental. According to La
Veranda front desk and some information I found online, there should have been
SUP for rent at a beach bar next door called Ocsen, formerly known as Rory’s.
However, when I checked there, I was told that Rory went back to his country
and took the boards with him. So, no paddle boards for me… But at least our
room #509 at La Veranda was large and comfortable, with a private patio and ocean
view. The hotel grounds are very green, with tropical flowers and red brick
walkways through the gardens. The buildings are done in French colonial style
and the furniture is heavy and somewhat dated. However, it all goes together,
even a four-post bed with mosquito netting.
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| Phu Quoc - La Veranda - view from our room |
For dinner, we took a taxi to Phu Quoc Night Market a couple
of kilometers away. During our taxi ride, we saw a few signs in Russian for
stores and restaurants, but didn’t give it much thought. We found a place with
sea creatures in tanks, similar to yesterday’s restaurant in Can Tho and about
as lively. The food – scallops, shrimp, and squid – was tasty, but not as good as
yesterday, and Saigon beer girl not as cute as yesterday’s Heineken beer girl.
Thursday, March 21
Today is Sofia’s birthday! After a very nice breakfast on
the second floor terrace overlooking the ocean, Sofia was presented with a
basket of red roses by the restaurant manager. I made a dinner reservation
there at the Pepper Tree Restaurant and asked for a table on the terrace, which
they promised to decorate nicely for our birthday dinner.
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| Birthday girl with basket of roses |
Then we took a walk on the beach, heading north from our
hotel. It was around 10 am but not too hot yet due to clouds. After walking for
about 10 minutes, I saw a fun Christmas tree like structure made from
Vietnamese conical hats in front of the Sunset Beach Bar. And right next to it
there was a rack with several stand-up paddle boards! They were inflatable, not
fiberglass, but beggars can’t be choosers. I rented a board for an hour for all
of 180,000 dong (about $7) and went off, while Sofia had a massage. It took a
couple of minutes to get used to the feel of inflatable SUP board, which was
light, bouncy and less stable than fiberglass boards. However, I managed ok and
enjoyed the hour paddling along the shore and looking at different hotels and
other buildings. I also saw several schools of fish in the water, some pretty
big.
After I got back, we went for a swim several times. The
water was so warm, you could just stay in it all day without swimming. Then we
went for lunch to a little local place about 0.6 miles away called Bun Cha Ha Noi
– Phu Quoc. Bun cha is a traditional Hanoi dish of little pork meatballs served
with broth, rice noodles, and herb salad. This place serves only bun cha and
does not have a menu but won rave reviews online, so I knew it was good. And it
exceeded all expectations. The broth had perfect umami flavor, the meatballs
were light and airy, and the whole dish just worked together, even noodles.
After lunch, we took a nap and returned to the beach for
more lazy swimming in warm ocean. The sunset was somewhat underwhelming as the
sun descended into clouds. We tasted some locally produced rum at the manager’s
reception and chatted with the friendly restaurant manager. He was a German,
previously working in Switzerland, who came to Vietnam a couple of times on
vacation and then got a job at La Veranda a couple of years ago. He said
international tourism to Phu Quoc is increasing, with direct flights from
London and a few other places including Moscow. The latter would explain those
signs in Russian and a bunch of Russians on the beach. The manager also said
that the place really starts hopping during EDM festivals a couple of times a
year, when famous DJs and their fans descend on the island.
Then we proceeded to dinner. The table was set on the
terrace overlooking the ocean and nicely decorated with rose petals and words
“happy birthday”. We had bun cha and mango salad for appetizers, and king fish
with eggplant and squid stuffed with shrimp for main courses. There was no room
left for desert, but they prepared a nice little birthday cake for Sofia, so we
had to at least try it.
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| Birthday dinner |
Then we walked over to Ocsen Beach Bar next door and plopped
on the bean bags thrown around on the sand under star-lit sky. The music was
good and ocean breeze felt nice. We had Tiger Crystal beers and enjoyed the
scene, and at 10:15 pm the fire show started. We were actually just about to
leave, but a nice waitress said “fire show”, so we stayed to check it out. The
show was awesome, with the guy twirling and juggling torches and other flaming objects
with good clubby music. It was really impressive, and the perfect end to a
great birthday.
Friday, March 22
After breakfast we headed back to Sunset Beach Bar so I
could grab a paddle board. It wasn’t open yet, so we took a longer walk on the
beach and returned after 9:00 am. I spent an hour paddle boarding, exploring
the area south of Sunset. There were a couple of large construction sites south
of La Veranda. Looks like the whole area is undergoing a development boom. Then
we spent a couple of lazy hours swimming and sunning ourselves. The sky was
almost cloudless and it was hotter than the day before. By noon it got too hot
to be on the beach, so we headed out in search of lunch. The choice was between
going back to Bun Cha Ha Noi, trying Saigonese Eatery (also very well
reviewed), or going for a taste of home at Winston’s Burgers and Beer. The
latter had rave reviews, and I was missing a good burger. So we went there and
had very tasty burgers (Californicafion for Sofia, John Wayne for me) with strong
Heart of Darkness craft beers. The place had American diner old style menus and
funky décor, but no air conditioning, same as most local restaurants. At least
there was shade and some breeze in the courtyard. The burgers were great just
as all the reviews said, but still not as good as at Sunshine Grill on Grand
Cayman.
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| Burgers and beer at Winston's |
After lunch, we spent a bit of time in the air conditioned oasis
of our room, to avoid the worst of the heat. Then we came out for more swimming
and beach time. Sky was still clear, so the sunset had a lot of potential. We
stayed on the beach until the sun disappeared into the ocean around 6:15 pm,
swimming, enjoying tropical drinks, and relaxing. The sunset today was simply perfect.
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| Tropical drinks at sunset |
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| Sunset |
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| Sunset |
For dinner we went to Spice House at Cassia Cottage just 5
minutes up the beach from our hotel and recommended for its creative use of
local spices. We reserved the table poolside with a view of the ocean, and
enjoyed our dinner under the stars while listening to the waves. Sofia had
Mekong seafood skewers and I had barbecue pork baby back ribs which were served
on a wooden board. The food was delicious and the setting just great.
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| Dinner at Spice House |
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| Dinner at Spice House |
After dinner we walked back, past La Veranda to Ocsen Beach
Club. Grabbed ourselves a couple of bean bags close to the ocean, ordered a
couple of San Miguel Lights, and spent the rest of the evening enjoying the
music and the fire show at 10:15 pm. We also asked our friendly waitress what
was in those blow-up balloons some people were inhaling from. Turned out it was
N2O, a.k.a. the laughing gas. The fire show was clearly the biggest hit,
because a lot of people left afterwards. We stayed a bit longer and called it a
night after 11:00 pm.
Saturday, March 23
Sadly, it’s our departure day, but we still have a whole
morning here. We got the hotel to extend our checkout from noon until 2:00 pm.
So, in the morning I went paddle boarding for an hour while Sofia had a
massage. And then we just stayed in the water until 1:00 pm, coming out for
short breaks in the sun. Then we took a shower and finished packing, and
checked out at 2:00 pm on the dot. Left our bags at hotel reception and went
for lunch at Phuong Bình restaurant on the beach next door. The food was good
and it was nice to eat with toes in the sand right next to the ocean.
La Veranda staff drove us to the airport at 3:00 pm. The
flight to Ho Chi Minh city was delayed by about 30 minutes, and didn’t get to
Saigon until after 6:00 pm. By the time we got our luggage, it was after 6:30 pm.
Not a big deal, but it was a final strike against my idea to make a run to city
center for Banh Mi Huynh Hoa sandwiches. Theoretically we still had enough time,
but getting stuck in rush-hour traffic would be really unfortunate. So, we
decided to just stay in the airport until our 11:00 pm flight. Connected with
the guys from wifi4asia and returned our mobile hotspot. Ate our last remaining
mango from Mekong delta and had Vietnamese coffee. Checked in our bags, went
through security, and had a dinner of pho, spring rolls, and chicken wings with
Tiger Crystal in a restaurant overlooking the airfield.
Bye Vietnam! Until next time.
