Mekong Delta Day 1

Another day starting with a vietnamese ice coffee. It's so good. Bought a coffee bun at the bakery which was delicious. Half way through the bun I found out why...look at that butter!!

We took a car ride with our tour group of 5, then a boat to Unicorn island where we sampled fresh fruits and listened to folk music. There were bananas (which were the sweetest ever), papaya, pineapple, jackfruit, dragon fruit and "brown kiwi". All were so tasty. I love the fruits here.


Next we went to Phoenix island. We did so many things I'm just going to list them and post pics. Coconut candy manufacturer, drank snake wine, held a python, rode a horsecart, tried a banana/coconut sticky rice wrap, had an awesome row boat ride down the river, coconut juice and another boat ride. The best part of Phoenix island was Susan screaming while she tried to hold onto the python.


We were hosted by a family living in Tra On, an island town. We helped with preparing dinner which was delicious. We had spring rolls, green beans, spinach soup and rice paper wrap.

Saw fireflies in the evening and then I had my "moment". Showertime. I made Susan stay in the shower with me which is an outdoor "building" with a toilet and a showerhead and a bit of space. This building isn't enclosed so you can only imagine all the bugs. Susan was my bodyguard against the huge bug that was sharing the shower with me. The thing was the size of 2 toonies. Anyways, how embarrassing.

Cu Chi Tunnels

What a day it was yesterday. We took a bus tour to the Cao Dai Temple and talk about being a bit undecided about religion. They are a mix of 4 reglions: budda, catholic, hindu and cao dai. It felt like we drove out for like 4 hours to see their noon service. It was pretty interesting. Obviously I had no idea what was going on, but I was absolutely fascinated with the fact that some of these people attend service every 6 hrs! So at 6am, noon, 6pm and midnite.




Then we visited the Cu Chi Tunnels which was the highlight of my day. This system of tunnels and traps were used by the viet cong during the Vietnam war. How crazy small they are. We had the chance to walk through one ourselves. But the one we went through was doubled in size so we can get through it more comfortably. So the whole time I'm crouched over. The height of the enlarged tunnel was right above my waist and at one point I even had to crawl through the tunnel. Did I mention this was the tunnel that was doubled in size! The original size of the tunnel is 80cm in height and 30cm wide. We went through only a 100m of tunnel, but it felt like forever. We saw how their booby traps looked too.

Dinner was the most amazing meal here yet. We had asked Vy, the lady that owns the hostel, about good places to eat and she suggested this seafood restaurant. We ended up going with her and she invited other people staying at the hostel to come out too so we had a group of 8 of us. Talk about ghetto though, but that's where the locals eat. Sitting on plastic stools and eating off of tiny metal tables in pretty much an ally way. We didn't even get our own dish to eat off of. It was pretty cool. Neither of us got sick from the food so thank you God =)

Today we're off on a 3 day tour of the Mekong. Heading out now!