Ho Chi Minh City [Saigon]

What a wonderful place. I know I keep saying this wherever we go in Vietnam but this place is so full of energy. Even more so at the moment as Tet, the Chinese New Year, [The Year of the Tiger] is on the 15th February and preparations and celebrations are well underway. There are beautiful lights, flowers and huge tigers made of all sorts of materials everywhere.

Butfirst, the journey from Dalat to Saigon. I have to tell you about the journeys because they are an important part of our adventure; in fact, they seem to give us as many stories to tell as the time we spend in our destinations!

First of all our mini bus to take us to the big bus almost went without us. We were due to leave at 10.15 am. At 9.15 we helped some people we had met from our guest house onto their bus with their luggage, the bus started to move off, and were set to wave goodbye when the receptionist came running out to inform us we should be on the bus too. Unbeknown to us, our luggage had been loaded on and the bus was just about to set off and leave us waving away. We had been given the wrong time! We huffed and puffed and squeezed ourselves on to the bus, all the while hoping we hadn't forgotten anything in the rush.

Luckily, our 'big bus' turned out to be very comfy, with good aircon but a very loud T.V. The Vietnamese do like noise! During the 8 hour trip we got chatting to a young guy from Canada who gave us his e-mail and said 'If you ever travel my way look me up' in a very Canadian accent, how cool is that? We have also been invited to Australia by people we've met; we will be buying a lottery ticket or two when we get back!

We stopped for lunch in a place, miles from anywhere and when you do that you know it can only mean one thing - squat toilets! Well, I try to avoid these like the plague because I think that's what I'll get if I use one but, an eight hour trip without a pee is asking just too much. Anyway, without going into too much detail, this was my first squat toilet experience whilst wearing flip flops and I spent the rest of the journey imagining multiple organisms [spell check] crawling all over my feet.

The route from Da Lat to Saigon is along a long, long winding road; up and down mountains with very perilous sheer drops to the side. The driver of the coach was much like most drivers in Vietnam, determined to get where he was going as fast as possible and not terribly concerned about anyone else on the road. One couple we met who had done the journey the opposite way the day before said they had killed someone and they were an hour and a half late arriving in Da Lat as they had to get a new windscreen ,.How inconsiderate of the guy to get in the way of the bus.

On our trip, several young Vietnamese were being sick into nappy sacks which they left dangling on the hooks on the back of the seats in front of them for the entire journey, topping them up every so often along the way..... Nice!

We were excited to be in Saigon alive. We dumped our bags in our room and headed out to find the nearest happy hour. After climbing 4 flights of stairs we felt we deserved our bogof Saigon beers and knocked them back pretty quickly. We were now even more excited to be in Saigon, but couldn't stand the music in the bogof bar any longer so we went next door, paid full price and listened to Hotel California, Bob Marley and the Killers, we had a few more bottles and I couldn't tell you what other records were played but I can remember punching the air to 'Sweet child of mine' at some point. Once I'd sobered up the next day I could imagine all the cool young back packers in the bar saying 'OMG look at those muppets!' Luckily people don't hang around these parts for long and they've probably all moved on now and I can show my face on the streets again tonight.

We've been 'warred' out the last couple of days. We visited the Reunification Palace yesterday and The Cu Chi Tunnels and War Remnants Museum today. All fascinating but gruelling stuff which leaves you wondering what is it all about, why the hell do we have to torture and kill each other , why can't we all just live in peace?

Tomorrow we think we will have a lazy day by the river and maybe I can drag Dave back to the market. Then Thursday we are up early to catch a 7 O'clock bus to take us to the 2 day boat trip up the Mekong Delta to Cambodia. It will be a sad 'goodbye to Vietnam, we've enjoyed every minute of this wonderful country, its culture and its people. [And its beaches, sunshine, cheap beer and loverly grub] But we are looking forward to our next adventure.