Alex: The taxi ride from the airport was the scariest ride of my life! It was scooters galore - flying in every which direction! Never had i been in a city where lane discipline was so disregarded. Signaling was a rare occurance, as was driving up the right side of the road, how anyone could drive a car around the city is beyond me. However, by the end of the trip Jo and i realised that the cars do pretty much what they want to do and the scooters go in, out and around them. What was interesting was that apart from a couple SUVs, a few taxis and some chauffer drive cars there were no other cars on the road - everyone drove a scotter; from men in business suits to teenagers to the old fishermen.

The hotel that we stayed at was lovely, it was a new hotel but built in a frenxh colonial style and had a really nice pool - a little oasis from the hustle and bustle of the city. The hotel was located in the 'nicer' end of town with some designer stores next to it, however, these were mixed in with run down buildings and local shops etc.

Overall a very exciting city - two days was certainly enough but a very interesting place to go visit.

Jo - The evening we arrived (and once Alex had recovered from the taxi ride) we went out for a quick walk around the hotel to see what the city was like. Having narrowly avoided being hit by several scooters we headed back to the hotel for dinner, then headed to bed. The next day we got up early and went back out into the city, wanting to make the most of our time there. Most streets in the area were full of shops and beauty salons, and although a few people asked if we wanted to buy something from their shop we were surprised at how little we were hassled, or even stared at. Considering we only saw a handful of white people, we definitely didn't feel too out of place - apart from being laughed at when we tried to cross the roads! Apparently the way to do it is just walk out at a steady pace and they avoid you, rather than trying to wait for a gap in the traffic (which never happened). After walking for a little while we came to a square with a statue of Tran Hung Dao, a military grand commander from the 13th century. Here we met another little guy driving something similar to a tuk tuk who was DESPERATE to take us to the war museum or china town! We managed to let him down gently, but he did walk with us for a while and showed us some things in the city - speaking surprisingly good english.

After lunch at the pool and a swim/sunbathe in the heat of the day we went back out and got a taxi to the war museum - a 20 minute journey that cost all of 2 dollars! Both Alex and I admitted we were quite ignorant about the war, and so didn't know what to expect. I don't think anything could really have prepared us for some of the images we saw taken by war photographers, it was a very very harrowing experience, and we're both quite surprised there isn't more hostility towards white people in Vietnam. We then took another taxi to 'Chinatown', which was MUCH more expensive (there doesn't really seem to be a system - apparently if you have a nicer car you have a more expensive meter!), in the hope of finding some more bargains ha! Unfortunately it wasn't quite what we expected, and most stalls seemed to be selling clocks and gardening equipment - very odd! In the evening we went to a little cafe for dinner, then found a coffee shop which offered free wifi, although it didn't really work! The temperature stays hot throughout the night, and was very very hot in the day - no sign of this rainy season yet!

Ho Chi Minh was an amazing experience - we'd never seen anything like it before! Neither of us would like to live there, or even stay for much longer than we did - it was all a bit too chaotic that we found it hard to relax, but we're definitely glad we got to experience it.