Hi guys,

Writing this from an internet cafe in HCMC (Saigon). It’s an awesome city that we all MUCH prefer to Hanoi in the North, for some reason. The people are a lot more friendly, the crazy mazes of streets are exciting – if a little scary – and you seem to get a lot more bang for your buck (we’re mainly talking lychees here). Today the other guys (Brad, Joe and Sophia) have gone on a tour of the Cu Chi tunnels, that were used by the Vietnamese during the war, and are also visiting the Reunification Palace and the War Remnants museum; not feeling so great so unfortunately couldn’t join them, but thought I’d take the opportunity to post some news on here and upload some photos of what we’ve been up to over the last few days!

Nha Trang was a bit of a hit and miss, as far as sea front towns go. We had already been warned about the built-up, touristy atmosphere, and also about the inexplicable volume of Russian holiday makers, so we weren’t really surprised to find a pretty hectic sand strip and, well, loads of Russians. The beach itself was quite nice. We spent the first morning pratting around on some ridiculous inflatable things tethered just offshore, before retreating to our hotel room with 5p pot noodles in the afternoon when a pretty big rainstorm descended.

When we hit the bars that evening, we bumped in to two Dutch guys that we shared a room with in Bangkok, (it’s a small continent), which was really cool! Their names are Ard and Sjoerd, however, following a slight error on Joe’s part when we first met, (accent barrier), we came to know them as Arse and T-shirt/John. Anyway, it was really great to see Arse and John again, and we spent most of our time in Nha Trang chilling out with them at the beach and sneaking off in pairs to get secret western snacks (we were all found out later when we decided to go out to eat all together and were recognised at the Texas BBQ restaurant by the owner – oops!) We also went for a cheeky sausage BBQ at an Aussie bar during the State of Origin game – that was an experience…
Not much else to say about Nha Trang, except that, finding the heat difficult, Joe decided he desperately needed a haircut. You’re advised not to visit barbers out here so, armed with Brad’s industrial facial hair trimmer, we made for the beach, and gave him a very respectable number 2 head shave on the sand – much to the amusement of the local vendors, and the disgust of the basically local Russians!

On to Mui Ne, the beach town most famous for its fish sauce – brilliant! We were staying in a ‘Backpacker’s Resort’ (less glamorous than it sounds, I promise) that was managed by the most horrendous American woman you could ever imagine. After she split our group up into two dorms, and refused to move us, on the grounds that she had a group coming later that weekend that she didn’t want to have to split up (!?!?!?) we formed an instant vendetta against her – unfortunately, I think we lost, as we still had to give her our money at the end of the day. We took a day trip in an old war-time Jeep to the Fairy Springs, and the White and Red Sand dunes, which (naturally) resulted in us all riding an ostrich that was being kept in a pen at the side of the springs (see video below) – one of the weirdest moments of MY life (can’t speak for the others) but a very cool experience! The boys also hired quad bikes at the white sand dunes, and took us on the back over the edges of some insane sand bowls! After a couple of near death experiences, Sophia and I left them to it in favour of a parody Asian tourist photoshoot atop the dunes (pics to follow). We finished the tour watching the “sunset” on top of the Red Dunes – there was no real sunset, so we just roly polied down the dunes for half an hour or so – serious sand in the pants! This definitely went down in everyone’s books as one of the best days of our trip so far, and was a great morale booster, as Vietnam travel has turned out to be a lot harder that anything we experienced last year, for some reason.

So, here we are in Saigon! We leave tomorrow for a three day Mekong Delta trip that will take us across the Cambodian border, and on to Phnom Penh. Here’s a brief itinerary of the trip, if you happened to be at all interested (i’ve got a lot of time, they’re not back for another four hours!)

Day 1: My Tho-Ben Tre – Can Tho
– Motorised boat to creeks, then a small row boat along creeks
– Visiting orchards and a bee-keeping farm (!?), tasting natural honey and honey wine (oh no!)
– Enjoy tropical fruit and listen to traditional music “free of charge” (awesome)
– See coconut candy production process; free tasting
– Stay 1 night in Can Tho to “discover the night life of the local people”…

Day 2: Can Tho – Cai Rang – Chau Doc
– Visit the biggest and busiest Cai Rang Floating Market
– “Join in local people’s life” – hmmm…
– Visit the rice villages
– Lunch (rice?)
– Continue on to Chau Doc for 1 night stay

Day 3: Chau Doc – Phnom Phenh
– Take a row boat to visi the Floating Fish Farm Village – more than 200 families farming Catfish
– Visit village of Champa (home of the sarong) and see the Moslem Mosque
– Lunch at border crossing (yum)
– Cross to Cambodia, then on to Phnom Phenh by bus

So, assuming all this goes according to plan (and why on earth wouldn’t it!?) we’ll be posting to you next from Phnom Phenh, Cambodia!

Cross your fingers…