We arrived at the border into Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam at 7am local time (Vietnam is 7 hours ahead of UK time). The currency used is Vietnamese Dongs, the current exchange rate is 21,000 VND to 1 GBP. At the border, we had to hand over our passports to one of the guys working on the bus. He fast tracked everyone's passport to be stamped out of Cambodia and into Vietnam. All we needed to do was get our bags to be scanned through customs, this was an efficient way to handle border crossing, we were impressed with the efficiency and organisation of it all!

When we all went through customs, the bus made its way Ho Chi Minh City, the traffic gradually became really heavy with a rediculous amount of scooters! As an observation, we hardly saw any tuk tuks. The bus stopped at 'Pham Ngu Lao Street', the backpackers' district, this was exactly where we needed to be. Jon from Colorado decided to stay at the same guesthouse as us for 2 nights. He met a girl called Ashley from Wigan and she stayed next door to us as it was cheaper.

We stayed at the 'Thong Thanh' guesthouse, the room was the smallest we had stayed in on this trip, despite this, we were not disappointed as it was very clean, it had air conditionning, hot water, fridge and free wifi! This guesthouse was ran by a Vietnamese family, it had an open plan entrance which leads straight into the living and dining room. The family was friendly and openly got on with their day whilst guests stay with them. For example, they would have dinner whilst guests come in and out of the guesthouse.

We had a much needed shower after a very long journey, we then met up with Jon and Ashley for lunch. We were recommended by one of the family members to eat at 'Pho 24' restaurant which was around the corner. This was a small restaurant specialising in noodle soup. We all had beef noodle soup and it was tasty.

After lunch, we all walked to 'Cho Ben Thanh Market', Jay and Jon both bought a T Shirt each. After browsing around the indoor market, we all walked back and rested until dinner time.

Later in the evening, we all met up for dinner, we were recommended by a family member of our guesthouse to go to 'Kim's Cafe' restaurant. Jay had pork with vietnamese fish sauce and steamed rice. Helen had fried fish with sweet and sour sauce. Jon had sweet and sour chicken with rice. Ashley had beef steak with fries, she let us all try a bit of the steak and it was very tender and tasty which we were all surprised about.

After dinner, we all had drinks at the 'Saigon Bistro' bar. We all had 'Saigon' draught beer. Helen also tried the grape wine juice which was sweet and tasty.