Saigon & Mekong Delta, Vietnam

Saturday’s 7 hour bus ride to Saigon from Dalat was the final leg of our three week journey down the full length of Vietnam from Lao Cai on the Chinese border in the north to Saigon near the south coast. Saigon is home to 9 million people who between them own about 3 million motor bikes, all of which seem always to be out on the road. Although the city’s official name since the end of the war in 1975 has been Ho Chi Minh City, everyone here still seems to call it Saigon. So I will too.

The old part of Saigon where we stayed has wider, straighter streets than Hanoi and has a more “open” feel about it. Like Hanoi, it teems with frenetic life from sunrise until midnight. Personally I prefer Hanoi as a place to visit – its maze of narrow winding alleyways through the old quarter is one of the most atmospheric places I’ve visited. But Saigon is great too, and thronging with tourists as well as locals.

On Sunday we visited the Reunification Palace, somewhat of a misnomer we discovered. It’s actually the well-preserved 1960s and 70s headquarters of the subsequently defeated South Vietnam Government. These days it serves as a museum devoted to war history and national reunification themes, and a conference centre. It’s a fascinating complex, most of it open to the public and still much as it was on that fateful day of 30 April 1975 when North Vietnamese tanks led by Tank 390 crashed through the front gates bringing an end to the southern government and a hasty departure by the remaining American personnel in Saigon. We strolled through the various floors and looked around the modest but tasteful rooms used by the South’s President Thieu and his colleagues. We saw the Cabinet Room, various dignitary reception rooms, the impressive conference hall (graced these days with a bust of Ho Chi Minh on the front stage), and President Thieu’s office. Down in the underground bomb-proof bunkers below the complex we looked around the map room, the radio rooms, the shooting practice gallery, and the Combat Duty Bedroom of the President. The latter room was austere, containing just a simple single bed and small bedside table with two telephones on top.

We moved on to the nearby War Remnants Museum, a graphic, gut-wrenching display depicting the “war crimes and aftermaths foreign aggressive forces caused the Vietnamese people.” This display is not for the squeamish and focuses mainly on the actions of the American Army and its allies during the 1960s and early 70s. Out the front of the building there is a display of captured planes, tanks, bombs and shells.

Both the Reunification Palace and War Remnants Museum displays make no pretence to present the events of the time and their aftermath from the perspective of both sides of the conflict. The displays portray the war as essentially one of foreign aggressive forces versus the Vietnamese people. There is no mention of why, in the years after the war had ended and all foreign armies had left, several hundred thousand Vietnamese people felt the need to flee from their own country in small boats, risking their lives in the process and languishing for years in overseas refugee camps until they were resettled in foreign countries.

On Monday we travelled 75km south of Saigon to see a little of the Mekong Delta. After a journey of several thousand kilometres commencing in Tibet, the mighty Mekong splits into 8 or 9 rivers and a maze of interconnecting channels shortly before it spills into the South China Sea. Covering an area of about 200km by 200km, the fertile Delta is home to 21 million people and countless paddy fields that collectively produce the majority of Vietnam’s rice. We passed through the Delta towns of My Tho and Ben Tre and spent several hours messing about on boats of various sizes, first on the Mekong itself and then on the smaller streams and the narrow, murky channels that wind between them. The heat and humidity were oppressive and the cooling effect of the breeze and water as we floated along was very welcome.

Nha Trang & Dalat, Vietnam

Another 12 hour overnight bus journey brought us 600km from Hoi An to Nha Trang on the coast in the south of Vietnam. Nha Trang is one of Vietnam’s popular beach resort locations, attracting those whose idea of the perfect holiday is to recline by a resort pool for several days, swimming, sunbaking, sipping cocktails, eating seafood dinners and having the occasional foot or back massage. How awful! But come to think of it, after 3 months on the road, not always in comfort, maybe that wouldn’t be so bad so we called in for a couple of days to check it out.

Nha Trang has beautiful sandy beaches and several offshore islands in the warm waters of the South China Sea. We took a boat out to Mun Island and snorkeled for an hour over the island’s fringing coral reef, home to 300 species of coral and 200 species of reef fish. Although it was not in the same league as Australia’s Great Barrier Reef, we saw many colourful corals and fish. On the boat we met and chatted with Della and Martin from St Albans just north of London. They retired 9 years ago and have spent much of their time since then travelling around the world. They certainly appeared to be enjoying themselves and were amongst the first to plunge into the ocean to snorkel over the coral.

Back on the mainland we went for a long stroll along the beach, stopping at the trendy Louisiane Brewhouse to try their in-house brewed beer, coffee and chocolate cake. Local women hovered around the perimeter of the Brewhouse hawking fresh lobsters, drinks and coconuts. We did a deal on two lobsters that the seller grilled for us over a bowl of smouldering charcoal slung from one end of the pole she carried across her shoulder (a bag of lobsters was slung from the other end). A little further on we bought fresh coconut and crunchy baguettes, and along with a few other things, dinner was literally in the bag.

During a brief rest stop back along the beach towards our hotel I glanced to the right to see Lee Tuan with a rather satisfied look on her face cracking the coconut on the head with a brick, then to the left to see a group of teenage girls who appeared to be army cadets or the like practising their assault rifle skills on the sand. The collective impact of these two images was vaguely unsettling and I was on my best behaviour for the next hour until the effect wore off. Back at the hotel we took our produce to the top floor terrace overlooking the ocean and prepared our sunset lobster dinner.

The following morning at 7.30am we were back on a bus, this time bound for Dalat in the Central Highlands seven hours to the south-west. Dalat is a small city of about 130,000 with French-influenced architecture. To us it seemed somewhat similar to Sapa though less impressive and less interesting. We walked around the bustling morning market that left us in no doubt that Dalat must be the fruit capital of the country. The market generally was overflowing with fresh fruits, vegetables, nuts, coffee, flowers, meats and hardware items. We’ve seen markets that were larger, but rarely so well-stocked. The Dalat countryside must have many skilled and efficient farmers.

Hoi An, Vietnam

World Heritage Listed Hoi An Old Town on Vietnam’s central coast was an international trading port established in the 17th century. Sitting on the banks of the Thu Bon River and just 5km from the ocean, much of the city’s old architecture remains today, but now manifested as attractive streets of tourist shops and cafes closed to motor cars.

Our bus trip from Hue to Hoi An took us through Danang, an apparently modern, prosperous city with some large construction projects underway including several big beachside resort projects. In Hoi An we checked into the comfortable Nhi Nhi Hotel staffed by exceedingly friendly people, just a five minute walk from the old town precinct. On our first night here we had dinner at a riverside café that looked fine from the outside but which proved to be Vietnam’s equivalent of Fawlty Towers. Our experience was essentially a re-run of the episode when Basil was asked to prepare a Waldorf Salad, the only difference being that our tribulation involved a Green Papaya Salad. After waiting fruitlessly for 90 minutes for this and other food to arrive, our patience snapped and we asked for the bill for the couple of small items delivered to that point. The subsequent carry-on by the waiting staff was vintage Basil.

We spent a few hours yesterday walking the beautiful, photogenic streets of the old town and through the rowdy, chaotic seafood market nearby. We had a light lunch along the riverfront, “saving” ourselves for the seafood dinner we intended to have later at the hotel. But within 100 paces of leaving, we found ourselves walking past the Cargo Café, full of western tourists, and from which wafted irresistible odours of fresh coffee, chocolate and pastries. They had the best selection and quality of such items we’d seen for months and within a minute or two we found ourselves seated in the Cargo sipping our coffees, sharing a chocolate muffin and Apple Danish, and watching the comings and goings on the street outside. The American couple sitting next to us introduced themselves. It was Bill and Leah from Washington DC and we shared personal histories and travel stories for a pleasant hour before they left to see the Museum of Trading Ceramics, one of the old town’s many historical attractions.

This morning we took a bus to see the ruins of the ancient Cham city of My Son about 40km southwest of Hoi An. This site is also listed on UNESCO’s World Cultural Heritage Register; it contains the ruins of a religious centre established in the 4th century AD by King Bhadravarman and occupied until the 13th century. Although much smaller than Cambodia’s Angkor Wat, My Son pre-dated Angkor by 400 years. The guide who introduced the site as we entered told us that during the Vietnam War, the Viet Cong at one point sheltered here amongst the ruins, attracting American bombing that destroyed a significant section of the complex. Bomb craters are still clearly visible around the site.

We caught a riverboat back to Hoi An, stopping briefly on the way at the fishing village of Kim Bong and passing many fish traps set in the water. Funky Hoi An is a fascinating place and certainly worth a visit for two or three days on any journey up or down the coast.

Hue, Vietnam

Friday 13th was a very enjoyable day for us in Hue on Vietnam’s central coast. We arrived early in the morning on an overnight bus from Hanoi after a journey of 700km south. Hue (pronounced Hway) is a small city of about 300,000 people just south of the former Demilitarized Zone that separated North Vietnam from South Vietnam for twenty years from 1954.

Hue was the political capital of Vietnam for 150 years from 1800, under the 13 emperors of the Nguyen Dynasty. As a result there is plenty of historical interest to see in and around this pleasant city bisected by the Song Huong (Perfume River). Convinced by the glowing testimonials in the visitors’ book at the Café on Thu Wheels opposite our hotel, we booked one of their half-day motorbike tours to see some of the sights.

First stop was the Citadel, the Emperors’ moated Imperial city on the north bank of the Perfume River. This sprawling complex contains many photogenic buildings in varying stages of restoration following decades of political upheaval and actual bombing of the site in the 1960s and 70s. We then zoomed through broad-acre rice paddy fields to get to the village of Thanh Toan to see the attractive 1700s tile-roofed bridge of the same name that crosses a stream here. Then it was on to the Thien Mu Pagoda, again on the north bank of the Perfume River just out of Hue. This was built in 1600 and is today one of Vietnam’s iconic historical structures that features on countless postcards. Next stop was the Tomb of Emperor Tu Duc, the fourth Emperor of the Nguyen Dynasty who ruled for 38 years from 1848. According to our Lonely Planet guide book, Emperor Tu Duc was a serious gourmand, expecting “50 dishes to be prepared by 50 cooks to be served by 50 servants at every meal. And his tea had to be made from the dew that accumulated on leaves overnight. Not too demanding then!”

Tu Duc’s Tomb and associated buildings are contained within manicured, majestic grounds graced by a winding stream, stone walls and bridges, and rows of pine and frangipani trees. This place is exquisitely beautiful and not to be missed if you ever come to Hue. From there we rode on to a Buddhist monastery to catch the monks’ 4pm chanting session. A large number of western tourists were sitting on the floor just behind the monks, listening reverently to the chanting. It was nice but I was more interested in the buildings and structures. Just to the side of the temple was an old cemetery with very attractive moss-covered headstones and small stone fences. Our final destination for the day was Vong Canh Hill that overlooks a sharp bend in the wide, clear Perfume River. There are two concrete bunkers at the top of the lookout with small holes in the walls. These were used first by the French, and later the Americans and their allies, to keep watch over the river traffic below and to blast any identified enemy boats that dared to pass this way.

Hue’s climate is tropical and the cold of the Chinese winter is now just a memory. The challenge now is to keep cool and minimize sweating. We realized afterwards that the motorbike tour was perfect for this. Although out in the open, the breeze rushing past as we zoomed along had a very cooling effect. It was a great day; our drivers/guides were careful and knowledgeable and it was a novel and fun way for us to see the sights. Café on Thu Wheels thoroughly deserves the accolades it receives from visitors.

We ended the day with dinner at Omar Khayyam’s Indian Restaurant just down from our hotel – it was impossible to resist the tempting smells we noticed every time we walked past earlier in the day. We were far less finicky and demanding than Emperor Tu Duc, merely requiring three dishes: Fish Masala, Chicken Vindaloo and Vegetable Curry. With side serves of naan bread and saffron rice of course. It was all excellent - I doubt that Tu Duc himself would have eaten much better.

As I write this we are reclining in another sleeper bus on Saturday afternoon headed further south down the coast. Reading or tapping away on the keyboard provides a welcome distraction from the crazy suicidal traffic outside. China’s traffic can be very bad in places; Vietnam’s is certainly worse with many drivers not fit to be behind the wheel. If you’re reading this it probably means I’m not dead.

Hanoi & Halong Bay, Vietnam

We arrived at the Hanoi railway station early last Friday morning on an overnight train from Lao Cai. After a skirmish with the buccaneers masquerading as taxi drivers at the front of the station we hired the least rapacious pirate we spoke with to take us to the Hanoi Elegance Hotel in the city’s old quarter. It was still dark when we got there and we met a young couple from Australia sitting outside the entrance waiting for the sun to rise and the hotel doors to open. They had already stayed there for a few days before going on a tour and were returning for another day. I gulped when they told me what they had paid for their room – it was triple what I was expecting so I headed off down the alley and within 200 metres found a small hotel already open and offering a far more palatable tariff after a little friendly arm twisting. We checked the room, liked what we saw, then checked in. Dawn arrived while we had a shower and we were back on the streets before 7am to join the early morning bustle.

The old quarter of Hanoi is fantastic – an exotic, balmy maze of winding alleyways teeming with concentrated life and colour, smiles everywhere, and swarms of buzzing motor bikes. There was fresh produce all around and every few metres a street-side food seller turning some of it into hot, fresh food ready to eat. We had the lamb, mint and vegetable spring rolls – the best food we tasted during our time in Hanoi. They were great.

We spent a few days wandering through the alleyways and checking out the interesting buildings and things for sale. So were many other Australian, European and American tourists. In a book store I briefly thumbed through the Viet Cong Insurrection Manual for Undeveloped Countries.

We also visited the former Hao Lo Prison a short distance from the Hoan Kiem Lake just south of the old quarter. This was first used by the French Colonialists to jail Vietnamese revolutionaries advocating independence. The wall displays describe the harsh treatment meted out to the prisoners; certainly the grim cells and guillotine still on display suggest that this was no Hanoi Hilton. The prison had a new lease of life for a decade from the mid 1960s when it was used to jail the pilots of shot-down B-52s whose bombing raids had ended badly for them during the Vietnam War (or what is called here the American War). The American prisoners famously nicknamed this place of incarceration the Hanoi Hilton, which is exactly what it was if the wall displays are to be believed. Unlike the French, when the Vietnamese became the jailers and no longer the jailed, life for the prisoners was apparently much more spiffing. They feasted on roast chicken and fresh vegetables they raised in the prison garden and had a generally jolly time playing games and sports like volleyball and basketball. At Christmas time they decorated their trees and were let out briefly to attend Christmas church services. I don’t know that this account is entirely consistent with the memoirs of the prisoners eventually released from the Hanoi Hilton near the end of the war. The prison has a very interesting display of artifacts including the clothing and flying suit worn by John McCain (the recent USA Presidential contender) and a photograph of him being rescued by Vietnamese people from the lake into which he plummeted after his plane was shot down. It’s quite OK to mention the war here; despite all the Vietnamese people have been through over the past century, they are friendly and welcoming to everyone. Most of the tourists we saw were French, Australian and American. Today’s mantra is not political ideology but business and national development.

On Tuesday we went on an overnight boat tour on World Heritage listed Halong Bay, about 3 hours by bus east of Hanoi. This bay is a fantastic sight with about 2,000 limestone karsts rising out of the tropical ocean water. Travel guides and internet travel sites warn about shonky operators on the Bay, despite Government efforts to raise the standard of tourist services here. We booked our tour at the travel agency associated with our hotel, thinking we could trust them as we were very happy with our room and impressed with the friendliness of the staff. But despite all our checking and prior clarification of details with the agent, our tour was very sub-standard. It only covered about a quarter of the promised itinerary and not the best part of the Bay, and our “deluxe” boat (that strangely was the only one on the water not to have a name) lacked even the basic features promised such as sufficient seating on the deck for all passengers. There were 16 people overnighting on the boat from about as many countries and everyone was angry, particularly those who had paid a much higher price for their tour.

There were some real horror stories. Most of our sympathy went to an elderly, seemingly timid German woman who was travelling alone. She told us that although she had booked a single room on the boat, she had just been told that due to some problem with numbers she would have to spend the night in a hotel on a nearby island. She also told us she thought the crew “didn’t like her”. A more likely explanation was that she was identified, rightly or wrongly, as the easiest “single” booking to push around. The boat docked at the island soon after and she was taken ashore along with some others who had planned to go to the island. The following day we met a young French couple who came onto our boat after doing some trekking on the island. We described the elderly woman to them and asked if they had seen her. They said they had – screaming on the roadside after being left behind when there was insufficient room on a bus. It was only the intervention of other tourists that convinced the guide to arrange additional transport for her. The bus went on its way, and when the additional transport eventually arrived it was merely a motorbike. The woman, who in all probability had never been on a motorbike in her life, was loaded on with her luggage and the bike then sped off down the island road through forest for the 20km trip to the hotel. We can only wonder at her mental and physical state when she arrived, after all she had been subjected to over the previous 24 hours and how her planned trip on Halong Bay that should have been a highlight of her time in Vietnam had unraveled so badly and so completely. We never saw her again.

Our own issues were admittedly less serious but we weren’t happy chappies either. Still, we got to see part of the Bay and it was certainly stunning. Hopefully, in time, the Bay tour industry will become more worthy of the magnificent natural resource from which its members make their living.

On our return to Hanoi we had a day to spare so we decided to make consumer affairs the theme of the day. We knew that the other passengers, with much tighter itineraries, would not have the time to follow up their own complaints so we decided we should make the effort. This took us to various parts of Hanoi we would otherwise not have seen. Our travel agent was not helpful and less than truthful. Second stop was the office of the company that our agent claimed had actually provided the tour. The company officer we saw told us that her company had nothing to do with our agent and unfortunately some unscrupulous businesses copied the names, logos, signage etc of competitors.

Our next stop was on the other side of town at the National Department of Tourism Administration in the offices of the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism. On our arrival we were given a seat and glass of water each in the guardhouse at the entrance to the office complex and a helpful woman came out to interview us. We told her our story and she asked what we wanted as an outcome. I said an apology and our $59 back. She asked us to put our complaint in writing and to email it to her, with any relevant photos, and the Complaint Investigation Section would then look into it. We thanked her for her helpful advice and adjourned around the corner for lunch. This was a trendy part of town with many old buildings in a glorious state of arrested decay and apparently the place where the beautiful people lunched. We obviously weren’t the natural clientele of the café we entered but we provided some much-needed visual contrast I thought.

The food was excellent and it was late afternoon when we spilled back out into the sunshine, the beer having taken its drowsing effect. But time was short now as we had a bus to catch, so we hurried back to our hotel, packed and checked out. As we swept down the stairs and through the lobby I told all and sundry what a good hotel this was but how badly their tours stank. I reserved my final words for the manager, telling him amongst some other home truths that he would shortly be hearing from the Ministry.

Outside, we caught a minibus to the long distance bus station where we sank after an energetic day’s work into a comfortable bed on a south-bound overnight bus, shortly afterwards leaving wonderful, atmospheric Hanoi and the commercial wreckage of our Halong Bay tour behind us. The evening lights began to twinkle attractively through the windows as we reached the city outskirts and I mentally commenced work on the submission to the Ministry. “Dear Comrades, Clause 3.2.9 of the Viet Cong Insurrection Manual clearly states …….”