Category Archives: Vacation

Vietnam ’12, Part 4: Can Tho

23 March, 2012 jpcorp Leave a comment

Our plan was to take a bus from Saigon to Can Tho, spend a night there and visit the floating market early the next morning, then head to Ha Tien also by bus for another night before taking the speed boat from there to Phu Quoc to spend 5 relaxing days on the beautiful island to complete our first journey in Vietnam together (I then flew back to Frankfurt while P stayed with her family in Saigon alone for 10 more days, the parting war hard I tell you…). Taking a bus in Vietnam however, is very much different from taking one in Europe. Although our bus from Saigon to Can Tho was quite comfortable with air-condition and wifi, the trip was tiresome cause the roads were often quite narrow, crowded and bumpy. A distance of roughly 200km could therefore easily take more than 4 hours.

We didn’t book any hotel in advance so the first thing we did upon arriving in Can Tho was looking for one. We had to search around Ninh Kieu Pier for a while (many hotels were fully booked, some overpriced, others too “simple”) before settling for one of the simple local hostel at the waterfront. Nothing fancy but clean and with a nice view across the Mekong river. We spent the afternoon strolling the streets to do what we like most, trying out street foods. The grilled eggs were fun to eat. The eggs are “injected” with some spices through a needle hole on top and then grilled on charcoal. An interesting new way of preparing eggs, we’d never seen it again anywhere else in Vietnam.

We made a mistake though, like most first-time tourists did. At the hotel foyer we were approached by a lady showing us brochures and albums of tours she was trying to sell. Not wanting to waste any more time looking, we decided to book a private boat tour to the floating market for the next morning. Not that we didn’t expect it but it caught us by surprise as she went directly from talking to us to talking to one of the small boat-ladies waiting across our hotel and paid her haft the price to do the tour for us. Needless to say, we were a little upset and felt sorry for the lady who owned the boat and actually did the hard work herself. Our lesson is: for a city like Can Tho you don’t need to book anything in advance. There are enough hotels/hostels at every price range and category at Ninh Kieu Pier. You can just go in, take a look at the room and agree on the price. Same thing with boat tour to the floating market. Go directly to the harbor and talk to any of the boat-owners waiting around and agree on the price and time to leave. You might end up paying exactly what you would have paid to the middle-man, but at least your money will go directly to those who truly earn it. And that’s exactly what we did 3 years later when coming back here.

Well, the experience was a little put-off but didn’t stop us from enjoying our day. We approached the same boat-lady and offered her a small sum to take us out for a small sunset cruise on the Mekong. She was of course very happy to do just that. She took us to a restaurant on an island across the harbor, which was part of a fruit plantation. Having very delicious fish and chilling on hammocks underneath tropical trees was the perfect end of the day:

A nice restaurant and fruit farm, on the evening of our arrival

The next morning at 5am she was already patiently waiting for us in front of our hotel to take us to the floating market, a 40 minutes boat-ride from Ninh Kieu Pier. We were very glad we took the “private” tour in the small boat, just the two of us. We could stop anywhere we wanted for however long we wanted to take photos, have breakfast, or just siting around and let the atmosphere sink in. (The real tourist boats just bring you there in a crowd of 20+ people in a big boat, let you have a quick look from the distance and then head back to the city to pick up the next crowd – not something we would recommend doing.) Imagine a whole sale market on the water with each boat heavily loaded with one kind of fruit, or vegetable only. Have a look at the beautiful scenery:

cantho2 — Starting at 5am in the morning for the floating market

cantho5 — Pineapple trading on Mekong river

cantho7 — Breakfast being served on the boat, pho bo and ca phe sua da

cantho11 — Guess what/whom he is looking at when smiling like this….

cantho1 — A real surprise shot taken by a German colleague whom we met by accident at 630am in the middle of the Mekong delta! It’s a pretty weird feeling when somebody totally unexpectedly calls your name from behind in such a remote location……….

Asia, Foods Foods Foods, Vacation, Vietnam

Vietnam ’12, Part 3: Saigon

20 March, 2012 jpcorp Leave a comment

My first time in Saigon with only 2 days to get an impression of a city that I mostly know from some history lessons at school and from which there are some “pictures” in mind from various Vietnam movies – both mainly influenced by the time of the US being present in the country.

Like in a lot of other cases when visiting a country or city for the first time, as soon as you are on the ground, you realize that you have to revise a lot of perceptions from the media/movies/history lessons. Politics suddenly don’t play a role anymore when you meet the people. The only visible reminders of the US presence in the country are the war museum and the former US embassy. The latter is well known because of a photo from Dutch photographer Hubert van Es of a helicopter landing on top of a roof on Apr-29, 1975 when the last Americans fled the country. However the building on the foto wasn’t the embassy but an apartment building of CIA employees.

In fact, the influence of the French colonial time is much more present in Saigon. There are a lot of official buildings downtown (have a look at the pictures further down) and in some residential areas there are even some streets with obvious French architecture. Even in the language there are several words that stem from French like cà phê, bia, ga to – just to name a few. Unfortunately, more und more of the colonial buildings are disappearing and make place for shiny business buildings, sky scrapers or high-end apartment houses.

Another obvious thing in the very busy streets of Saigon the the love of the people for coffee, fresh fruit and food. Vietnam is the second largest exporter of coffee in the world and you find many coffee shops and various roasts all over the place. I strongly recommend cà phê sữa đá (Vietnamese iced coffee), perfect for hot weather but beware: highly addictive with a large potential to stay on your hips…..

But now have a look yourself…..

saigon9 — In the park in front of the mayor’s house

saigon8 — The post office, built by the French during the colonial times

saigon_14 — Inside the post-office with Uncle Ho overlooking the scene

saigon5 — In front of Nôtre Dame – except that it’s in Saigon, not in Paris

saigon12 — Best fruit in the world, you can eat it all day long

Chom-chom is my favourite (also known as Rambutan)

saigon4 — At the coffee shop – Vietnam is the second biggest exporter of coffee in the world !

saigon0 — Foto session on a bridge across Saigon river

saigon6 — Beside Saigon river, in front of Saigon’s skyline

saigon7 — Yummy fruit juices at lunch break

saigon10 — Street food: freshly made waffles and madeleines, baked on a coal oven

Asia, Beach, Foods Foods Foods, Our Most Favorites, Road trip, Vacation, Vietnam

Vietnam ’12, Part 2: Hoi An

15 March, 2012 jpcorp Leave a comment

Hoi An is definitely our second favourite city in Vietnam after Saigon. It’s very touristy yes, but you receive decent services for your money and the foods are excellent (we kinda plan all our travels around the foods). Also, the city mayor had long ago forbidden all the restaurants in town to charge foreigners more than what the locals paid for, which made this town even more pleasant to visit.

Hoi An is also famous for its tailor industry, you can for example have a suit made over night at a decent price and excellent quality. But you could run into the risks of paying too much for it, so shop around for price before making the order because even though the shops appear to be of different owners, they might have their clothes made from the same tailors that worked behind-the-curtain. It’s the biggest industry in this town. Don’t be afraid to bargain in Vietnam, whatever they say, offer them half of it and walk away ;-), it won’t always work but it’s worth a try. We’re not good at bargaining ourselves, sometimes we just do it for fun and pay what we think the good is worth to us. People gotta earn their livings after all. We often give generous tips to those who need them the most (Xich Lo riders, street-food vendors, small family-run shops etc.) and negotiate our way with big hotel chains and resorts to make the most value of our money.

On our search for a quiet place to stay we came across Villa Hoa Su, a very small hotel with only 5 or 6 rooms and a huge garden that was so beautifully decorated that we ended up spending most of our time there. We appreciated the fact that they didn’t try to build a five-story “plastic” hotel on this ground and focused on offering guests a very unique experience instead. The common open space serving as the restaurant in the middle of the garden surrounded by fish ponds was actually an original ancient house that the owner had brought pieces by pieces back from Hue, the Imperial Capital of Vietnam during the Nguyen dynasty (1802-1945). Saying we liked this place a lot is an understatement. If we could, we’d move in here in a heartbeat.

hoian pool — Breakfast by the pool everyday

hoian1 — Our own outdoor shower and marble bath tub under the stars

hoian3 — Best pool ever (mainly because of the mermaid….)

hoian7 — Different view of the pool (same mermaid)

hoian6 — Very beautifully decorated garden

hoian11 — Cua Dai beach & Coconut water – our favourite drink

hoian15 — A must-eat in Hoi An “Banh Quai Banh Vac” at its original place 533 Hai Ba Trung street, Hoi An.

hoian14 — Water spinach field in the middle of the city

hoian9 — Dinner downtown at Morning Glory, a quite famous restaurant chain both to locals and tourists. It definitely had a tourist price tag, but the foods were authentic and very tasty. We would eat here again anytime.

hoian13 — Baby rice plants (still planning to do this at home)

hoian8 — Hoi An downtown: A dog studying art in front of a gallery

Asia, Beach, Road trip, Vacation, Vietnam

Vietnam ’12, Part 1: Da Nang

10 March, 2012 jpcorp Leave a comment

My first time in Vietnam – exciting! After a long flight to Saigon, our next location was Da Nang, a city that I had only heard about in Magnum PI and had no clue what to expect. It was hot and humid outside the airport and we had to wait some time before two guys arrived with our “motorbike” – which actually was a small Yamaha scooter with a motor too small to carry the two of us and our luggage (even though P had reduced the luggage to the absolute minimum required: “we travel light !!!” – which is kind of the opposite of travelling the German way: “be prepared for any possible weather condition”).

Finally we headed for the Son Tra resort on Son Tra peninsula north of Da Nang. Two roundabouts later my adrenalin level had reached my lifetime high but we were still alive! It takes some time to understand that there is only one traffic rule in Vietnam: “There is no rule”. This may sound chaotic but in the end it works quite well because everyone drives pretty careful, considerate and does not insist on their right. The only thing you need to do is to indicate as early as possible in which direction you intend to drive, stay on your track and never ever make sudden moves because it would be hard for the other motorbike-drivers to react appropriately. To be honest, once you’re used to this single rule, it makes life in the traffic much easier than driving in Munich for instance where everybody thinks he or she is always right regardless of those oh so many rules in Germany – which is particularly true for the “urban bike warriors” (like a friend is calling the bike drivers).

Having no street map, we ended up on a dead end mountain road on Son Tra peninsula. Unfortunately, we only found out at the end of the road after having forced our poor scooter up the very steep road. So we enjoyed the view across Da Nang and then drove all the way back down the mountain. We finally found our resort and spend a couple of very relaxing days on the beach and in the city, trying all kinds of Vietnamese street food, fresh fruit, cane sugar juice, fresh coconuts, …….

JP Travel Diaries

Category Archives: Vacation

Vietnam ’12, Part 4: Can Tho

Vietnam ’12, Part 3: Saigon

Vietnam ’12, Part 2: Hoi An

Vietnam ’12, Part 1: Da Nang

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