Well, that's Vietnam done, on time and on budget ... for now! We've had to be quite strict with daily allowances of money but it has meant we've stuck to the budget. It isn't quite the spirit of travelling we perhaps had in our minds 2 years ago but on such a long trip it's necessary. If anyone has been inspired by the blog and is wondering how much it's all gonna cost we've done most things we wanted to do on $20 each per day.

Vietnam has been a real contrast. Rural areas like Halong Bay and towns like Hue and Hoi An there has been stunning natural beauty, genuine adventure and memorable experiences. The cities, Hanoi in particular, are such an assault on the senses that they take some real getting used to. It depends what you're looking for in a trip but if we were to come back we wouldn't necessarily base the itinerary around the two big cities.

Saigon has slowly grown on us over the last couple of days. Yesterday we took in the Reunification Palace and War Remnants Museum. The Museum was the best we've been to so far but a sobering experience, it is a completely non-Hollywood look at the Vietnam war. The exhibits were completely uncensored, making the 'War Crimes' and 'Chemical Warfare' sections particularly difficult to take. The phrase 'History is written by the victors' was never truer than here though, although nothing was fabricated the level of bias did detract slightly from the messages.

Today we've been on a tour of the CuChi tunnels and Caodai Temple. CuChi was a massive series of underground tunnels used by the VietCong during the war, the exhibits themselves were disappointing and getting towards the worst kind of touristy faux, right down to the wax works and gift shop! Caodai is a completely separate religion which has Victor Hugo as one of their 3 holy men! The tour as a whole was the first time we'd forgotten to ask about maximum group sizes . . . not a mistake we'll be making again in a hurry.

Bus to Cambodia is at 8am tomorrow, another day in Saigon would have been nice but Cambodia and the Temples of Angkor Wat await!

Love to everyone, miss you all

Greg and Steph xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx