What a great start to my day! 7am breakfast delivered to my room where I sit with a beautiful view of the Mekong Delta
fabulous breakfast overlooking the Mekong Delta
I went with the recommended beef stew with bread (toasty hot) as my main with shrimp dumplings as the side and fresh squeezed OJ
traffic in Ho Chi Minh City
Unfortunately Cosmo is limping this morning so he must have injured himself overnight. I make a quick change of plans and sign up for an afternoon tour of the Chu Chi Tunnels and head out to do the activities that Cosmo can't do. I also figure out which rideshare app is best here and sign in to my Grab app so I can start using Grab bikes. Traffic in Ho Chi Minh City is crazy as the motorbikes seem to rule the streets, swarming around cars. Everyone uses them. I saw an old lady going to sell her food stuffs on the back of a bike hold a giant stick with two buckets of food balancing on either end. My first stop was the War Remembrance Museum (former named the Exhibition House of American and Chinese War Crimes). I had no idea we attacked Vietnam in violation of the Geneva convention with countries all over the world protesting against us including Germany, Sweden, and Norway along with others from Europe, South America, and Asia. It was actually a perfect preparation for going to the Chu Chi Tunnels that afternoon.
Old woman headed to work on back of bike
interesting drink that was more of a meal with stuff inside
I had some time to kill before meeting for the Tunnels tour so I went to a market nearby. I miscalculated as the idea of paying about half their asking price isn't correct here. I found out later it is closer to 1/5 to 1/8 their starting price. Vietnamese are master bargainers. I bought a carved owl keychain which dropped from 280k to 100k pretty quickly. Later in the Tunnels gift shop I bought two more for only 35k each. I will definitely avoid the Ben Thanh Market in the future as my bargaining skills are not what they once were. I did however buy an interesting drink with a bunch of sliced fruit, beans, and jelly at the bottom with ice and coconut milk.
The meeting point was very close to the market so I got there early. Unfortunately they must have had something go wrong earlier because they were supposed to pick up all the other people in the tour from 11-12:30 then we all head out at 12:30. Instead we spent the next 90 minutes picking another 8 singles or couples up and traffic went from slightly bad to awful. We were moving incredibly slowly and running about 2 hours behind schedule so 6 people rescheduled for the next day and got off the bus. I never appreciated riding a Grab motorbike more than when I was stranded on that bus going almost nowhere for an hour! The tour itself was really good. I felt pretty awful about being an American, but it was really interesting seeing the traps they laid in the woods, the holes in rocks they made for smoke holes when they cooked (it's foggy at night so their smoke blended in), and the hidden entrances covered by leaves.
typical type of trap used to impale the invading American soldiers
I was also extremely surprised to learn that there are still landmines buried in the woods so wandering off the trail is not allowed, though there are no barriers preventing you from doing so. Clearly they have no lawyers here and if you get blown up doing something stupid, it's on you. The tunnels themselves were pretty nifty and not as small as I envisioned. Most of the time I just had to duck down as I walked.
Chu chi tunnels
the tunnels drop down to a new level
blue crabs at the crab restaurant. live ones in the tanks
[/float]Traffic heading back into the center of town was also backed up. After coming to a long intersection where the bus was only moving about 25 yards every green light I finally asked if I could hop off there. I did and caught a Grab bike home which zipped right through traffic like a ferocious tiger. Once home, I didn't feel like venturing out into the main city again so I walked with Cosmo a few doors down to get my fresh crab. The restaurant has tons of fresh crab mostly blue crab. I'm way too lazy to pick all the meat out of the crab so instead I got the crab meat in glass noodles. Cosmo made another new friend. He's quite popular amongst the children. I ate back at my apartment and it was good though I still think Dungeness crab is better!
Cosmo making friends at the fresh Crab restaurant
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My blue crab in glass noodles
This featured blog entry was written by nutmeg2000 from the blog My Semester off for travel 2025.
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