Cambodia to Mekong River Delta, Vietnam

After leaving Battambang we left for Phnom Penh, Cambodia to arrange our trip into Vietanm. Once again we had a great time in Phnom Penh where we stayed close to the riverside, planning to leave for Vietnam the next morning.

The riverside in Phnom Penh is a very nice area, but not a realistic place for Cambodia, really a beautified tourist area full of nice restaurants, cafe's, hotels and bars. We spent the late afternoon and evening in this part of the city and enjoyed socializing, eating and drinking. We also arranged our trip to Vietnam through our guesthouse. We'd decided to take a slow boat that would travel mostly along the Mekong river, before turning off into some smaller waterways and finally reaching the small city of Chau Doc, Vietnam, along the banks of the Bassac river.

Our lazy trip along the rivers took the better part of the day and with the warm weather and sunny blue skys the whole experience was very pleasant. The riverside immigration was straight forward and we were made to feel very welcome into Vietnam.

Along with a small crew of two on the boat there was also another couple from London. We had initially planned to travel from Chau Doc through to Ho Chi Minh City (which the Southern Vietnamesse prefere to call by its older name, Saigon). While on the river we were chatting with the other couple and found out that they were going to spend another 2 days getting to Saigon, traveling on the rivers and spending some time staying with a family that lives along one of the tributaries. We decided that it was a nice plan and arranged to join them, this turned out to be a really great decision.

We spent one night in Chau Doc, a nice little city that bustles with riverside life, full of markets where people from all around the Mekong Delta come to sell there goods, mostly food. The people here were very friendly and it was clear that Vietnam was very different to Cambodia. It was clear that the economy was much healthier and people here enjoyed a much better standard of living than their Cambodian neighbors.

The next morning our boat navigated through a maze of rivers to get to the home we would stay at. On the way we stopped at a fish farm and a small and interesting riverside village that was made up of an entirely Muslim population of about 2000. In Vietnam the Muslims represent only about 0.5% of the population, most Vietnamese identify themselves as Buddhist (although in reality it is not so clear cut as the major religion here is actually a combination of Buddhist, Confucianist and Taoist) .

The fish farm was particularly interesting. Farmed fish represents 15% of all the fish consumed in Vietnam right now and these fish come from small family run fish farms rather than large operations. The fish live in nets underneath floating homes along the Bassac river and many of the family's began their business using government grants which are available for starting this type of business.

After a few hours on the river we arrived at the family home where we would stay, deep in the Mekong Delta. We spent a lovely afternoon playing games with the family, eating their traditional food and swimming in the river. We were something of a curiosity and many of the cousins, aunts, uncles and neighbors come by to hang about the house too. The food they made was very, very good and we felt very lucky to be able to enjoy some real home cooked Vietnamese food, delicious!

In the early evening before dinner we went out to do some fishing with the daughters of the family. We were given bamboo sticks with a piece of string tied to the end and then a homemade metal hook, I was a little skeptical as to how well this would work. We left from the house and began to follow a small trail through a lovely orange grove, the air was rich with the smell of the citrus fruit. After navigating our way across some precarious logs balanced over water ways and some serious mud we arrived at what looked like a small man made canal that ran between the orange grove and a large tree lined rice field. We then baited our hooks and started fishing and the 6 of us started pulling out fish like you wouldn't believe, the most successful of us was the 5 year old girl from the house who caught four fish in no time at all, so much for modern fishing technology. We really enjoyed our little fishing adventure and eventually made our way back to the house with a bucket of fish which we were sure would be a big hit. On the way back we ate all sorts of berries and enjoyed the smells of fresh lemon grass which we picked and rubbed between our fingers, it was all a great delight for the senses.

That night we enjoyed another great meal and chatted at length with a neighbor whose English was excellent. He told us about life in the Mekong Delta where food and fish are available in abundance. We also talked about what life was like during the Vietnam war and what the families had to do to stay alive and safe while the military boats powered their way through the rivers looking for the enemy hiding out in homes. It was a great insight into life in this part of the world and it's amazing how different it is from our own. These people are mainly farmers, they work the rich soils of the Delta, constantly battling against the water which is seemingly everywhere. This area is formed entirely from sediment of the 4500 Kilometer long Mekong river, the waters here run a rich colour of reddish brown with all the silt in it. So much silt washes down these rivers that the shoreline can be extended by as much as 79 meters in a single year. All of this makes for the great agriculture and this region produces enough rice to feed the entire population of Vietnam (84 million) and have a significant amount left over for export. They also grow many other crops.

The next day we left our family home and traveled the rivers to see floating markets near My Tho. We also stopped to visit a small business that produces rice paper and another business that produces incense for the temples that are in abundance all over Vietnam. After several hours our boat docked and we boarded a small mini bus for Saigon.

We only stayed in Saigon for two nights. It was a busy busy city and there must be enough motorbikes here for every person in Vietnam. Justin managed to get hit by a motorcyclist who was more interested in his female passenger than where he was going. Other than a tire mark on his leg he escaped without injury but the whole event made subsequent road crossings in Saigon a little scary. We didn't do too much in Saigon, just walked around a bit and enjoyed the general hustle and bustle. But we left pretty quickly anxious to hit our next stop Mui Ne beach, kitesurfing capital of South East Asia and a beautiful tropical beach area to boot.

Lots of love to family and friends, wish you were here...