On the road on another bus heading to another country. It's been insane how much we've done & seen already. Not long now and we stop in one place for 2 whole weeks! We're so used to moving every few days that its gonna feel so weird to stop but I'm ready for it.

In 11 weeks we've seen as much as we could squeeze in of 4 countries. We have one more little stop to do before downtime though. Ho Chi Minh city in Vietnam. We are returning to Vietnam after the Philippines and heading up the country so to make the most of Ho Chi Minh we're heading in a little early. The bus & border crossing went well. It's our last land crossing of our journey & we've been surprised at how simple they have been. Apart for the stern faces at desks they have been trouble free.

We'd heard from other people about what HCM was like, especially in regards to traffic. My god they weren't wrong! 10 million people with 5-7 million mopeds and motorbikes. There are no designated crossings and no breaks in the stream of vehicles. Luckily for us we'd been crafting the art of Asian road crossings since Burma! If in doubt shadow a local crossing the road! But if that fails you just have to walk with no hesitations and rely on the hundreds of mopeds to drive around you.

A man met us off the bus and was insistent on walking us to the hostel we'd booked. Low and behold when we got there were "electrical problems" and we were taken to another place. We winded through the alleyways following the man blindly to the new place. The room is fine as we agree and settle there for the next few nights.

To put this in perspective a little from the little road we were taken down these tiny alleyways. They are bustling with activity, pop up stalls line both sides serving steaming noodle soup or smoothie bars blending away. There's enough room to walk 1 or 2 a piece down these lanes but with the constant flow of mopeds also using them its a tight squeeze. It looks dirty but everyone is sat on mini stools eating and drinking.

We did a few things in Ho Chi Minh like the walking tour to see the city sights. I noticed in our accommodation & nearby a few disabled locals. Although I noticed I thought nothing else of it and carried on. One of our stops we decided to take was the war museum. Again my history knowledge is s***, I know there was a war in Vietnam, I know some of the films I've watched are about it. I've always switched off when people talk about war and hate war films, I now believe it was a self preservation method to avoid getting upset about what you learn. Asia can be biased in its reporting (as can America) but one thing it doesn't do is censor. Which makes all of the horrible parts of history so much more shocking to learn about.

Vietnam is no different as you see photographs taken during the fighting & the aftermath. I will never forget looking at a photo that was of a group of Vietnamese, the war photographer stopped the soldiers to take a photo then let them carry on an execute them. The fear in their eyes was crystal clear and I couldn't believe it was someone's job to capture those images then stand back and watch those same people be killed. Who on earth in their right mind would or could do that job.

The museum also spoke about "Agent Orange", one of the chemicals used by the Americans with devastating effects. 3 generations are effected as by eating or drinking things that were covered in this chemical causes birth defects and disabilities. Then it clicked about all the disabled people I'd seen already, all these people are still effected by a war that finished ages ago. A letter written in the museum drove it home a little further.

A girl writes to Obama asking for aid to be extended to the children as aid only went to the parents from the war & the children are still suffering. She was born as 1st generation with deformities from her mum who had eaten crab from an area affected with the chemical. She mentioned that she cannot have a family as if she did the chemical would cause her child to be born disabled and even more generations after that. She cannot earn because of Agent Orange an it effects.

I have so much trouble comprehending war now. Two sides fighting for stupid reasons and so many innocent people being affected in the crossfire & for decades after these innocent people are still suffering from the effects of war. It's just crazy.

The next day we'd booked to go to the Cu Chi tunnels where thousands lived in tunnels to keep their village from being invaded. To be honest the tour was a bit poor as we were on the bus with so many other people. We'd been so lucky before with smaller groups and now this 20 people group just wasn't as enjoyable. The tunnels themselves are super busy so we felt rushed through them the whole time. At a stop we had the opportunity to shoot different guns. Sy turned into Rambo and went off to shoot an AK-47! I wasn't sure if my shoulder could handle big guns like the ones they had on offer so I didn't do it.

Then we lost the group, they were meant to meet in an area, we were there, they weren't. I was annoyed as when 4 people went missing earlier because we were moving too fast the guide searched for them. No-one bothered for us so we spent the next 20 minutes trying to find them in amongst the many other tour groups. When we eventually found them the group had had the opportunity to go down into the tunnels, we had missed that opportunity, which was the whole point of going! Frustrating to say the least.

We enjoyed shopping the markets in HCM and allowed ourself a session to buy stuff to post home. The markets were more intense than before. Now as well as every stallholder calling you they are taking you by the arm to show you what they're selling. Driving a hard bargain we were happy with our purchases. We also bumped into Steph & Kyle, a couple we'd met in Siem Reap. Gotta love it when you bump into each other without knowing you're both gonna be there. We stopped by our local dodgy, dirty looking smoothie bar in our alleyway. It was always busy so we figured its gotta be good. We weren't wrong, seriously the best smoothie i've ever had, looking forward to returning to have another!! One night we went up the skybar to watch sunset and got a lovely view as the lights came on over the city. We walked down the road to discover massive Xmas light displays outside the department stores. Locals would dress up and pose for photos by both their family & a team of special Xmas photographers. The road was rammed with mopeds and it seemed every family was off to the lights to do the same thing! The kids (and some adults) dressed up in Santa costumes. It was so surreal!

Click here to view our Vietnam photos