Our five days in the Mekong Delta flew by, although to be honest, left me with mixed feelings. The landscape of waterways, narrow, rickety bridges, boats and riverside dwellings on stilts, or even floating, is fascinating, and the abundance of fruit crops growing all around, coconuts, mangos, tangerines, the enormous, wasps' nest-like jackfruit, clusters of tiny, brown "long-uns", just to name a few, all thriving on the incredibly fertile land, is amazing. On the downside, however, we also saw the worst side of Vietnam, with repeated dishonesty on the part of those we had to transact with, which was really disappointing and left a bitter taste in the mouth. And no more so than on the first day. Our hotel receptionist in Saigon sold us a pretty inexpensive day tour to get us to our initial, chosen destination, Ben Tre, supposedly saving us the long-winded route by public transport via a bus station 10km from the city centre, for not too much additional cost. But half way through the tour we were presented with a choice of a 10km motorbike ride at the other end anyway, or a bus ride from the town before, as the tour didn't actually reach Ben Tre. She will have known that this was going to be the case. Anyway we chose the bus station from the town before, and the tour guide arranged for us to be dropped off, quickly departing once our bags and selves had been deposited on the pavement, leaving us to discover that there were no more buses that day. He will have known that this was going to be the case. So, plan C, some motorbike riders persuaded us to let them take us to the highway, a couple of kilometres away, and pick up a private bus passing by, to our revised destination of Vinh Long (a better option than Ben Tre, seeing as we weren't going to get there easily anyway). The private bus duly turned up, but the driver, explaining that it was the last, and therefore our only, option that day, tried to charge us an extortionate amount, about four times the going rate. We stood our ground, bluffing that we'd rather not go at all than pay this ridiculous sum, and eventually we settled on what he was asking for each of us in total. Which wasn't an unreasonable price, but it was a pain going through the process. Unnecessary conflict holds no attraction for me. And these weren't the only instances of integrity trailing behind money that we experienced during our time in the Delta, nor throughout our time in Vietnam for that matter, but I think, on this occasion, that it was the solid day full of that left a more resounding mark than usual. Maybe I'm being naive to think honesty is a reasonable expectation of anyone, anywhere, or perhaps there's a moral case for those less well off to try to extract as much as they can from someone like me, clearly with enough money to travel and not work for a long period of time, in order to feed and clothe their families. I don't know, but rightly or wrongly, it did leave a bitter taste.

Fortunately, though, there was also much about the Delta to pick us back up again! People we didn't have to transact with were incredibly friendly, particularly kids, as always, with choruses of "hello"s and ear to ear grins, or even mini-celebrations, upon receipt of our "hello"s in return. Also, the towns were refreshingly un-touristy, having spent the last couple of weeks on the well trodden path of Ninh Binh, Hue, Hoi An and Saigon. Which sometimes makes simple things like finding dinner more difficult, but it's nice to have a bit of a challenge now and again! And as I mentioned earlier, the landscape is amazing, and totally different from anything we've seen before. The rivers, as part of the transport network, seem as important as the roads, with riverside petrol stations, shops and even entire floating markets, serving the local communities. And the diversity and quantity of fruit crops growing is such that it defies belief how the region manages to be such a prolific producer of rice (Vietnam being the second biggest exporter, after Thailand, with the Mekong Delta producing by far the biggest surplus), because I don't know where they find space to grow it all! I guess the ability to harvest three crops a year (which is one or two more than pretty much anywhere else) helps, but even so, we barely saw any open fields, with a constant stream of villages lining both rivers and roads, each one stretching out and leading straight into the next, all set within the forests of fruit trees. We had a really nice couple of days in Vinh Long, with a homestay night in the middle (if a home with room for about twenty guests can actually, legitimately be called a "home"stay! But it was relaxed and out in the sticks, to be fair), exploring on boats and bikes. Then, a couple of buses later, via the region's capital, Can Tho, where we had a very entertaining few hours wait in the bus station - I felt like we were part of the furniture by the end, having mingled with the locals and hung out in the local cafes! - we went to the port town of Rach Gia. A single day there, sorting out our "Superdong" ferry tickets and generally meandering, and then we left for the last leg of our tour of Vietnam, Phu Quoc. Billed in the Lonely Planet as an unspoilt, tropical paridise, sounds good! I've already written about it in my notebook, so give me a couple of hours to type it up, and then read about it right here!