The Mekong Delta

So... we went to My Tho - the capital city of Tien Giang Province. We took a boat over to 3 little islands on the delta, the first was beautiful, lots of jungle style landscape. We took a small motorized boat along this tiny stream which looked like it could easily be crocodile infested! The scenery was lovely. We visited a honey bee farm where we also saw how they make their coconut candy to sell. This young boy of about 13 hacked away very impressively at this coconut and eventually broke it and then cut it open on this sharp metal rod sticking out of the ground! These coconuts are left for 1 yr to mature then churned up and made into this delicious candy which they sell locally. We got to try it all along with some banana wine that they also make here which tasted very much like the rice wine - very strong. Mike bought some candy of course - cant say no to sweets!

The young boy then appeared holding this gigantic snake!!! He was offering it around for us to hold so me and Mike had a go! He was really calm actually and it wasn't scary at all!! I didn't want to give him back!!! hahahaah!

We then sat down to drink some honey tea which they made for us and was WAY too sweet for me... especially after the candy.

We then took these long boats down the river and got to wear the traditional conical hats, very funny!!! The countryside around this area of the Mekong delta is lovely, loads of green fields and sleepy villages. There are also LOADS of rice paddies and fishing villages - a completely different way of life to anything i've seen before!

We had lunch at another village which was horrible. Rice with old vegetables and a tiny piece of tofu and i cant even think about the slab of meat on the other side of my plate - still makes me want to be sick. It looked alarmingly like a pigs ear.. that was straight off my plate and dumped in the lovely elephant ear fish soup.. EWWWWWWW!! We then sat to watch some of the villagers play us music and sing to us - even the kids!! Really sweet!! And they brought us lovely fresh fruit - pineapple, papaya, banana, dragon fruit and pawmellow and we drank some Vietnamese tea!

So basically we just ate ALL DAY!! hahah!

It was a nice relaxing day after the previous one. That night we joined the locals and went for a big bowl of steaming hot pho!!!! NOODLE SOUP!!! It was so funny... they brought us over a bundle of basil leaves, lime and chillies and loads of beansprouts which, after watching others, we worked out we were supposed to add to our soup. The Vietnamese love pho.. it's one of their signature dishes and it's eaten at all times of the day - breakfast in particular!! Strange!! It's lovely though.. i'm sure i'll miss this like i miss thai green curry!!

We got on the Saigon beers at a cheap street bar then had an early night again in preparation for our early bus to Phnom Penh, Cambodia, in the morning. WOOOOOOOO!! I was sad to leave Vietnam but SO excited about Cambodia!!!

We booked a cheap bus, at 10$ to get across the border to Cambodia we were sure it would be of the Laotian style but we were SO wrong!

We up early because on the cheap buses we're usually starving by the first time we stop so we thought we'd fill ourselves up before we set off. We were SO wrong about this bus!! We got on the bus and were speachless!! It was lovely!!! Big comfy seats, WITH CUSHIONS!, a toilet at the back, free bottles of water, a lovely informative guide telling us exactly what was going on and best of all.... a free breakfast in a xmas present style bok from one of the local bakeries!! A cheese and ham turnover and an apple bun!!!

Anyway... more about Cambodia in next blog.... phew!! It's so hard keeping up with my blog!!

xxxxx