After a night at the Sheraton, with room service and an all you can eat breakfast, we had to leave the comforts of a holiday and move back into cheap accommodation. However for some reason in Vietnam all you can get is a bedroom and en suit, with air-con and a TV for 4 or 5 dollars, but you can't get any less for cheaper. On the 6th the plan was to meet Eva at midday, and then spend the rest of Vietnam with her; however we had no idea where she was staying, and Saigon is a pretty big place. (It is officially called Ho Chi Minh but everyone still calls it Saigon because its a much nicer name). We gave up on trying to find Eva, checked into our own place; in which me and jack had to share a single bed, with a cover that would be just big enough for a baby, and headed to our first sight: The War Remnants Museum, which used to be called the American War Crimes Museum, (the name changed, but the contents didn't).

The museum is basically a propaganda museum for the communist regime, only showing the war crimes of the South Vietnamese and Americans, and not showing any of the North Vietnamese and Viet Congs war atrocities. The whole bottom floor is devoted to actions condoning the American entry into Vietnam war, which included Americans burning themselves in front of Parliament buildings, and a picture of Hugh Thompson, Jr. a helicopter pilot who during the American Massacre at My Lai, turned against the soldiers of 1st Battalion, "Charlie" company to save civilians at Son My village. Whilst seeing what the Americans did in Vietnam was, without meaning to sound sadistic, interesting, it did get frustrating after some time because you could not learn much about the war, and this was much of the case with any tourist attraction to do with the war. Anyway after the museum, we headed back, and finally met up with Eva. We ate dinner, and then she told us that we were going on a trip on the Mekong Delta tomorrow, and we had to be up at 7 in the morning... o dear.

At 7:15 we quickly rushed out of bed, grabbed all our bags (because we had to move hostels), and quickly marched to meet Eva, and catch our bus to the Mekong. Our guide spoke very good English and loved a joke, however due to lack of sleep our appetite for humour wasn't large, and him saying one the bus had left, "i hope your all looking forward to a trip to the Cu Chi tunnels." we weren't in the slightest bit amused. We got on the tour boat, and stopped at the little islands in the middle of the river. The first stop was a coconut sweet making place, and the sweets were pretty nice, and we got to watch the process of them being made, in which many health and safety regulations were breached (I alerted the authorities, don't worry). A man has also made a coconut religion, and considering the religion, a relatively lavish temple has been made on the island. Our next stop was a beekeeping island. Here they showed you the hives, with thousands of bees on them. However, without much warning, they then grabbed your hand and shoved a finger in the hive to get honey from the bees; for some reason the bees didn't sting you though. We then enjoyed the honey in the company of the swarming manufacturers, and moved on. However whilst we were meant to be heading back, the weather turned against us and we were stuck on the an island, (not for 2 days like the Gillis, more like 20 minutes, so not really a big problem, or worth my typing). We were off to the Cu Chi tunnels the next day, with another 7pm start, so we decided an early night was necessary.

For the Cu Chi tunnels, we had the same guide as the Mekong river, so when he said, "i hope your looking forward to a trip to the Mekong river", we weren't fooled, and sat smugly at the back of the bus (because we're the cool kids) whilst everyone was fretting about getting on the wrong trip. As customary with bus journeys, we slept, and got to the Cu Chi tunnels in no time, it seemed. To start we watched a video, about how Cu Chi was a peaceful place and then the Americans came along a ruined it. So to protect themselves from the bombardment from the B52's, and as a surprise tactic, they lived in tunnels underground. You hear about the network of tunnels in the Vietnam war being small, but i had no idea to what extent. They took us to tunnels that had not been widened for tourists, and Adam and I had no change of fitting inside, we couldn't even fit through the entrance hole, and Jack and Eva were very tight fit. Due to the brilliance of iCloud there should be a video of Jack and Eva crawling through the tunnel on my laptop in my room, so you will be able to see what it was like. They also showed us examples of hidden traps made by the Viet Cong, which where absolutely terrifying, brutal, and genius if you value creativity in that sense, (again photos on the laptop). They then took us to a shooting range, where we had the chance to fire weapons used in the war. Me and Jack went for the AK, and Adam went for the M1 Grand. Unlike Jack and Adam, who decided to fire single shots with an aim to hit the targets, i just emptied my magazine as fast as possible, because that's what i thought you do with an AK. To be fair, it drew kudos from the guy watching us. We then finally went to the tunnels that had been widened for the likes of Adam and I, but not much bigger. Despite following a group in what was basically a single track tunnel with only a few turn offs, Jack managed to get us separated, and after about 5 minutes of crawling through we emerged, dusty, muddy, sweaty and exhausted. Next we had the joys of sampling some Viet Cong food, which was basically boiled potato but worse.

We decided to stay a day longer in Ho Chi Minh, as there was a few things we hadn't seen. This was the Reunification Palace, which was uninformative and again rather one sided, then we went to the Notre Damn cathedral in Hanoi (it was colonised by the French). The cathedral was alright, but when you've seen European cathedrals, it looked quite bland. Then we went to another museum, but it was closed... so on the whole a great day. O yea and it rained.

We got the sleeper bus up to Dalat the same day. It took 6 hours, and we arrived at 2:30, which meant none of the hotels were open and we had to spend a night in the bus terminal. Dalat is a town in the central mountains, so it was a rather cold nights sleep, however it was worth it for the time we spent there.

We are currently in hue, having been to Hoi An where we had our suits made. I apologies that i am a bit behind on my blogs, and it may mean they come in thick and fast, so i hope you don't mind. Cheers.