Day 87 Ha Tien – Can Tho

It was a really early start for our journey to Can tho and begun with our moto drivers picking us up at 5:20am. They took us to the bus station 2k out of town for 15,000VND (50p), which then left at 5:30. Only couple of minutes into the journey and we picked up the American lady, who met the day before, with her two sons. When finding out she had been conned and that the bus she was on was in fact a local bus and not the VIP bus she had paid a lot extra for, she kicked off massively and got herself thrown off with her kids, fortunately they did have transport arranged to take her back to town. To make up for lost time, the bus driver decided to drive even more like an absolute lunatic. We picked up a lot of people on route, some of whom were the women who sold food, drinks, etc and who also flirted outrageously with the bus driver and ticket conductors, sometimes even grabbing the wheel for a laugh!!!! The journey took slightly longer than expected, 7 hours in total, plus we were dropped a little further out of town that we expected and conveniently next to a couple of moto drivers who then tout for a business into town – everything is scam. Our guesthouse was okay – more like a homestay really – dead cheap though, so we were happy. Walking along the river we bumped into the lady from the bus, Mary, who actually turned out to be really nice and we sat and chatted for sometime. To relax from our long journey, we had a few drinks along the river and a good meal at a popular restaurant.

Day 88

Got up a 5am again for our Mekong river boat exercusion – not loving these early mornings! There were three other people on our boat and all were really nice. Went to the floating markets, bought a pineapple for breakfast, then I took up the boat drivers offer for a shot of rice whisky – nice! The floating markets were pretty cool and it was really interesting to see all the local people going about their daily business by boat. Went to another floating market and saw a mobile soup vendor but unfortunately we didn’t stop – starving. Traveling down the smaller rivers, we saw rice fields and fruit orchids on either sides of the river banks. In broken English we were told by the boat driver to get out and go for a walk, think we went in the wrong direction as definitely got a little lost and probably shouldn’t have walked over the tiniest bamboo bridge – pretty nerve racking. The locals watching us cross the bridge thought it was pretty funny and actually took photos.
We had Pho Bo for lunch but Em went without, as she was too scared to sample the local delicacy. Later in the evening, we managed to find the blind massage place that the lonely planet recommended. Em got a lot more than she paid for, when the masseuse asked Emma to sing happy birthday to her whilst she massaged her bum!!! Long story! Went to an internet café for a little while, and then had some street food; Pho Bo. Billy and Jordan came and met us there… a couple I met back at our guesthouse from New York. We all had quite a few drinks together – shame we’re not going to New York on the way home.