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After relaxing in Cambodia and seeing all of beautiful temples of Angkor Wat, it was on to our next destination...Vietnam. We boarded a Cambodian day bus which had semi reclining seats, air conditioning, refreshments and Ryan's favorite part, endless Jackie Chan movies! Seeing as though Cambodia's roads are both paved and unpaved, this made for a rather bumpy journey, but it was well worth it because of the scenic landscape with rice paddies, families of farmers and plentiful water buffalo. After 6 hours we changed buses in Cambodia's capitol Pnom Penh and headed to Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon) for another 6 hours. We were a little weary of crossing the border, but it turns out it went really smoothly as we had our Vietnam Visa ahead of time.
Driving into Ho Chi Minh City in the evening was quite an experience! It was astonishing to see so many motorbikes, cars, buses and bicycles weaving in and out of lanes and the nonstop sounds of honking horns! Then add on more component of people crossing the street and it is a pure miracle that there are not more accidents. You can become mesmerized by all of the traffic...LA has nothing on Ho Chi Minh!
After jumping of the bus with some fellow tourists, we headed to our hotel on foot as it was only one block away. The streets were bustling with food hawkers, tourists, locals and people trying to sell all kinds of things! We had our first lesson in crossing the street from a kind gentleman from LA who was familiar with the traffic. He said, "be confident, don't hesitate and they will go around you". Ryan grabbed my hand and I practically closed my eyes the first time! We arrived at our hotel, Saigon Mini 6 and we were pleasantly surprised with our room decorated for our honeymoon. The staff was so pleasant and helpful and really excited to see our reaction. We got settled in and found our room to be clean and very comfy, minus the hardest mattress in history:)
I have to admit our first meal we had Western comfort food, but it was just what we needed and a nice cold Saigon Red beer, yum! The next day we decided to sleep in a bit and check out the city and learn to navigate the streets, yikes.
We went to the central market and had so much fun walking through the endless aisles and stalls of clothes, shoes, fabrics, produce, seafood, and souveneirs. It was a bit overwhelming, but really interesting and the smells of all of the food was so good! Especially, the Vietnamese coffee.
Next we asked the hotel if they could recommend a good authentic Vietanemese restaurant. We headed to a traditional Southern Vietnamese Restaurant and enjoyed some of the local delicacies...so good! You'll have to check out the pictures. The following day we decided to do a Ho Chi Minh City tour and piled into a 13 seat mini van with a whole bunch of other tourists. Our first stop was the War Remnants museum which was a bit depressing, but informative. It is a Museum about the American War (Vietnam War) told uniquely from the Vietanmese perspective. We felt a bit strange as we were American and it was a bit Anti American to say the least. The tour guide reassurred us that Vietnam is happy to look to the future and that her generation knows this was all in the past. The next stop was a traditional Vietnamese coffee house and I have to say I have been converted so delicious (it may help that they put sweetened condensed milk in it). We also went to Saigon's China Town and saw a beutiful Pagoda and the extremely crowded and bustling Chinese market. Our last stops werer the Reunification palace, a traditional craft shop, Notre Dame cathedral and the Central Post Office. We were really happy to a tour as it would have been so difficult to get around to all of these spots with the traffic and the humidity!
After a few days in the busy city with so much history and yummy food, we are off to hit the beach for some more relaxation and hopefully some snorkeling!
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