Down the River

Yesterday, Nancy and I decided we wanted to get out of Saigon to see some countryside.  I admit to having some trip envy after starting to hear about how great Cambodia was, so I proposed a trip on the hydrofoil that zooms past our cabin window several times a day.  We walked over to the hydrofoil docks and did the student thing--just figured out how to get a ticket and find where it was going and took off on a whim.

 

After a 1 hr 49 min ride, we arrived at Vung Tau, a beach town on the China Sea.  We were limited by the departure time of the last ferry, so we didn't go to the beach but just walked around.  The Vietnamese law student sitting next to us offered us a ride, but we politely declined since we had no way back.  It's amazing how nice people are when you share candy (which I usually have, and more on that later).

This is a quiet little town on a Monday, even though it was hopping on the weekend.  We could even cross the street without worrying about motorbikes.  Other than tourism, fishing seems to be the main activity here, although at this time of the day, most boats were in and people were dealing with repairing their nets.

On recommendation, we caught lunch at Tommy's, an English speaking restaurant whose proprietor is Australian.  The played American music that I knew the words to. Then we walked far enough to see the 105 ft. statue of Jesus.  Then we headed in the opposite direction and walked through the city park where a bunch of school kids took great delight in saying "hello" to us.

The park was filled with white poinsettias--some 2 feet high--and nice statues.

The absence of hustle and bustle made this town so peaceful, especially in  contrast to Saigon.

The hydrofoil ride back was nice from the standpoint of seeing lots of scenery.  Nancy stood on the deck outside the cabin and chatted with another rider--Andy from Indiana--and learned a little more about the river. We had seen some areas adjacent to the river that were segmented in pond-like areas made of concrete  I guessed sewage treatment plant and Nancy guessed a saltern where salt is extracted.  According to Andy, they were raising shrimp in these areas.

The hydrofoil itself was a little down on its luck.  The windows were hard to see out of, and it was pretty dirty.  Another family who had been on this trip earlier in the week missed the last ferry and had to take a $52 cab ride home.  We were happy to have the return trip, and did see a couple of SAS kids going along.

There, I just said "home" for back to the ship.  We've started to feel this way after long days prowling around strange places.  But before we went home, Nancy had to go by the tailor to see how her clothes were coming along that she was having made.  Not so well, it turned out.  One riding jacket was fine, but the tweed one was too short and the pockets were wrong, and it didn't have a vent in the back.  After lots of negotiating, they decided to re-do it by 6pm the next day.  Stay tuned.

We stopped in to Wrap and Roll for dinner.  It was nice until a huge disturbance took place.  It just turned out to be three of the ship families out with their kids.  That's what happened to the rest of my candy.  I got the kids all sugared up to make up for disturbing us.  Really, the kids on the ship are great and provide us with entertainment.


When we got to the shuttle stop at the Rex hotel,  a bunch of happy SAS shoppers were waiting for the shuttle, and we all headed back.

And here's today's motorbike photo--a guy carrying a funeral flower arrangement.