Friday, October 30, 2009

Backpacking Journey: Vietnam

Finally, we reach Vietnam on the 6th day of our backpacking journey.

Day 6:

Headed to HCMC. Travel by bus that took us 6 hour to reach.

View of the street before reaching Vietnam borders

Vendors on the ferry

Check in hostel 96 at Bui Vien Street. One of the famous street with lots of backpackers hostel.
After rest for a while, we started our walking trip, exploring the town.

Statue of Tran Nguyen Hai on horseback, in front of Ben Thanh Market.

Ben Thanh Market

Inside Ben Thanh Market

Municipal Theatre

Notre Dam Cathedral

Us

Us again
French style post office, oldest post office at HCMC

Inside the post office


And of course, we would not let go of the opportunity to send some postcard back to our jealous friends. LOL.
Siang with our postcards

Night view of the Notre Dam Cathedral

Day 7:

Mekong Delta day. Took their local tour and spend our time from morning till night on boat for the whole day on Mekong river, world's 12th longest river and 7th-longest in Asia..
Ouchs.. sit till my backside also pain.

Before boarding our boat

Local lazing around on the floating house

Us, on our luxury boat

Board on little "sampan" to have our lunch

Paddy field (view taken when we stop for toilet break)

Of course we have toilet break, cause there is no toilet at our luxury boat.

Our luxury boat

View before sunset

Sunset view. Love this pic

Another sunset view

Jumbo ship

Dining there would be very expensive and bored. Because from the dork, I can heard people singing karaoke and their singing sucks. Probably those drunken obasan. LOL.

Porridge

Very yummy street food as our dinner before we spend our night at hotel. Oh ya. Forgot to mention its a 2D 1N package.



Day8:
Wake up early and have our breakfast with the local. If not mistaken, we are the only group in the whole tour group that dare to taste their local food. Other than cheaper, we personally think we should try their local food. If not, I would felt very guilty.

Coffee
Floating market

How to know what they sell in each boat? They will hang what they are selling high enough for all to see.

Siang posing with the pineapple at the pineapple boat

More picture of the floating market.

Finally we landed on land. Visit the wet market and rice factory. And then headed back to HCMC by bus.

Yummy meat bun
Fruits on the market

Our tour guide showing us on different types of rice

Bus front bumper crack while going up on the ferry. Everyone of us have to get down from the bus to lighten the mass of the bus in order for it to be successfully parked on the ferry. LOL. Overload.

Day 9:
Had our breakfast nearby before headed to Cu Chi Tunnel.
Mee soup

Local coffee

Tour guide explaining the structure of the tunnel

Trying on the "hidden" hole.
It's stuffy and smelly in there. Hard to imagine during war time, people have to hide there for whole day. Now u see me...
Poop... now u see him...
Ho Chi Minh selipar
After exploring and experiencing the tunnel, we went to Binh Tay Market, Cholon's main market. It's wholesale market.
Had our lunch inside the market. They style of zhap fan.


Saw lui lui and bought her straight away. After that, we had big headache. How to ship her back? Damn.

Main entrance of the Tian Hou Temple

YP and Siang looking at leng lui.

Day10:
Benh than market for final shopping. Then to notre damn catherdral again.
Pack our belonging with our final shopping items and headed to airport.
Us, at the airport

Picture of the day:
I really wonder how the electrician can work with the cable if there is a broken one within the lines. It's looks damn complicated. Amazing.

So, that's the end of our backpack journey. Hope that can have another long journey somewhere soon enough. Till then, sayonara.