Day 13: Arrival in Ho Chi Minh city

Up early to get to Da Nang airport an hour away, so we could fly to HCMC. After the sleeper train experience, I needed a break before trying more sleeper methods of travel, so the short hour long flight down to HCMC was the perfect alternative to a 12 hour coach trip. It is weird to see so many westerners on an internal flight, and so few Vietnamese. It shows the price of flights compared to normal Vietnamese incomes.

We'd decided to get the hotel to arrange a taxi this time to avoid the hassle factor, and then it was an half hour trip in the usual city chaos I have come to associate with Vietnam. The hotel is on the edge of the backpacker ghetto, and is quite a nice one. We've been upgraded so we're on the 6th floor and although there isn't much of a view, it takes us away from the noise of the street.

Once settled in we headed out to start to familiarise ourselves with HCMC itself. It is different to Hanoi as the streets are wider and more open, which is the French influence, although there are just as many motorbikes. It is also a lot hotter, so within minutes of being outside the sweating becomes overwhelming and dehydration is a real possibility. We stocked up with water and walked out towards the main market in the city, Ben Thanh. Once out of the market, we headed northeast towards the Notre Dame and the General Post Office, which are two of the few real "sites" in the city. By this time we were well and truly suffering with the heat, so the appearance of one of the many street vendors, this one carrying coconuts, was very welcome. I did some bargaining and we sat down to drink.



A few more blocks, feeling much revived, and we eventually came to the GPO. This is a slice of history itself as it looks like it hasn't changed since the tanks rolled in. It still has the telephone booths people once used to make calls, all wooden booths in a row down each side, although one side has now been converted into ATM's and is less romantic as a result. Time for a photo of the adventuring twosome outside and then off again.



As we came out of the GPO, the threatening clouds overhead stopped threatening and actually took action - it began to rain, proper big drops that turned into a torrential downpour. There was suddenly a wind too, so it was a real soaking for the city, which we escaped from into the nearby Diamond Plaza, a very swish new shopping mall. The centre shows there is some money being made in this city somewhere as it stocked all the latest brands and reminded me a bit of Selfridges. We headed for the food court, which tickled me as it seems to be a very Asian thing to have food courts everywhere, even in the posh shopping centres. There was a cheaper youth-oriented version on the top floor where KFC and Pizza Hut could be found, but the one for adults further down didn't have any western brands in it. So far we have not seen a McDonalds anywhere in Vietnam and that must surely be intentional, although I can't find out why.

Once the rain abated, we headed back to the hotel, and collapsed until evening when we headed out again, this time into the backpacker village behind our hotel. It is as tacky and charmless as you could hope, with lots of cheap hotels and places to eat, packed in tightly with travel agents and clothing/souvenir shops, all trying to catch the unwary passer-by. The best thing about it was leaving it behind when I walked back in the hotel.