Travelling through Vietnam - Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon)

This is the final post about our journey through Vietnam which ended on the 5th February 2014. We travelled from Hanoi to Ho Chi Minh City - the North capital to the South capital - and stopped at Ninh Binh, Hué, Hoi An and Nha Trang along the way. We travelled the whole way by sleeper bus which turned out to be an interesting experience (see other posts)! 

The three of us had flights booked out of Ho Chi Minh City on the 5th February so, by the time we were in Nha Trang, we were running a bit short on time. We had originally planned to stop in Mui Ne but decided against it as we preferred to spend longer at our final destination rather than at the beach resort. We travelled overnight from Nha Trang to Ho Chi Minh and arrived ridiculously early in the morning (I forget the exact time). Again, not wanting to get ripped off by taxi drivers, we made our way to our hotel on foot. When we got there, however, we found that it was completely shut up - doors closed and shutter down! We ended up having to wake up the family who ran it to let us in. To be fair to them, we had booked for that night and we arrived so early that we had to pay for another so they weren't expecting us! It was also during the festival and it seemed that there were not any other guests in the hotel. 

Ho Chi Minh seemed different to anywhere else we'd been in the country, more European than the other cities. There is evidence of much more European-style and modern architecture, as well as wide roads and statues. However, there was still evidence that we were still in Asia. There were still loads of scooters. Everywhere. We walked down a more traditional market street and the Benh Thanh Market near where we were staying was full of people trying to flog fake goods for the best price.

The roundabout in front of Benh Thanh Market

Lights celebrating the new year and lots of scooters!

Market street

Meat stall

One of the things that Alex had been particularly looking forward to in Ho Chi Minh was going to visit the  Cu Chi Tunnels, a vast network of connecting tunnels from during the Vietnam War. We booked a half day trip to go out to see them having decided it would be difficult to make our own way there. It was a good thing we did, as everyone there seemed to be with a tour group and our guide was good. He had been in the Vietnam War himself and showed us his gunshot wound. However, he spent most of the day singing which didn't really fit the setting! "Hello, Ladies and Gentlemen, You come from different countries, To Vietnam on holiday, Come along and sing with me" (or something like that!). We were able to walk around the forest looking at various exhibits of weapons, a tank, underground rooms etc. as well as the gruesome traps the Vietnamese made for the enemy. There was also a shooting range where tourists could pay to fire various guns. The gunshots added to the atmosphere of the forest. Tourists were allowed to get into a replica tunnel opening for photo opportunities and crawl through one of the tunnels, which had been made bigger and had lighting installed to accommodate large Western tourists! The tunnels are definitely worth a visit.. 

Me in the entrance of the tunnels

One of the traps

A tank

Another trap

They must have been lethal!

Exploring the tunnels

Alex in the tunnels

We seemed to visit Ho Chi Minh at a good time as the flower festival was on to celebrate the new year. There were thousands of colourful flowers for people to look at, some of them in different shapes, with lots of horses to celebrate the new year.

Pretty flowers

Colourful

This was all the way down the street for at least 500m

We enjoyed wandering around the city and seeing the various sites.

Modern buildings (with Alex and Chloe)

Municipal Theatre

Statue of Ho Chi Minh in front of City Hall

Notre Dame Cathedral

Reunification Palace

On the 4th February, our last full day in Vietnam, it was my 21st birthday. We discussed various options for what to do, thinking we ought to do something special, but realised that we'd been doing so much over the three weeks that it would be nice just to have a relaxing day. We considered visiting the Mekong Delta but were sick of being herded around on organised tours by then and preferred the idea of a lie-in! After some research, we found that Ho Chi Minh had a bowling alley and some Indian restaurants so we decided it would be a day of home comforts instead. The night before, we went to a really nice Thai restaurant (in preparation for mine and Chloe's next destination!), followed by a  few bars late into the night, so a lie-in on my birthday morning was just what I needed. It was fun to go bowling, something I hadn't done in a few years, and hadn't done on my birthday for even longer! I did have a bowling birthday party for my 10th birthday though. It is often joked that the typical food of Britain is Indian and at home we enjoy our Indian takeaways and occasional meals at Indian restaurants, so it wasn't difficult to choose which cuisine I wanted to celebrate with. 

Action shot!

Results of the first game

Enjoying our Indian

Birthday girl!

The next day, I went with Alex early in the morning to get a taxi to the airport from one of the travel agents. He was setting off to fly from Ho Chi Minh, back to Hanoi. Then from Hanoi to Xiamen via Hong Kong (the same way we came). Then from Xiamen to Dubai via Hong Kong. Then from Dubai to Denmark! That's an awful lot of travelling but I'm glad he arranged it so that he could be there to celebrate my birthday. Chloe and I left later on that day. On the way to arrange our taxi, we saw a lion dancing show as part of the new year festivities. That evening we flew to Chiang Mai, Thailand, via Bangkok. It was sad that our time in Vietnam was over and that we no longer had Alex with us, but we were looking forward to our next adventure!

Lion dancing in the street

The lion

Back in Xiamen after my Vietnam/Thailand trip

I am now back in my room in Xiang'an campus having got back to Xiamen yesterday afternoon. 

Last time I posted was when I had just left Xiamen and was at Hong Kong airport waiting for my flight to Hanoi. Since then I've travelled from Hanoi to Ho Chi Minh by bus in Vietnam, flown from there to Chiang Mai, Thailand, via Bangkok, spent a week there apart from a day trip to the golden triangle meaning I went to Laos for half an hour and flew back to Xiamen via Bangkok. 

I had an amazing time and will be doing some more detailed blog posts about my adventures soon. Off to Kathmandu, Nepal, tomorrow for my cousin's wedding though. So excited!

First photo of the trip - Eating at a street food restaurant in Hanoi, Vietnam

Last photo of me of the trip - Chloe and I at Chiang Mai beach club, Thailand, having just been tubing down the river

End of semester exams and winter holiday travelling

I still need to write a post on spending new year in Hong Kong but as soon as I got back to Xiamen on 3rd January I was busy catching up on lessons I'd missed and preparing for my end of semester exams. Exams started on Monday this week and finished on Wednesday. I also had to do a performance for my 唱歌学汉语（Learning Chinese through Song) module which I didn't find out about until that day! Exams went ok apart from a not so good 口语 (oral) exam and I passed all of my modules. The pass mark in China is 60% which is a bit of a difference from 40% in the UK! On Wednesday night we had a last night out together as a way of celebrating exams and end of semester. Some people are leaving as they were only here for one semester so there will be new people when we go back. 

The majority of those who are staying are spending the month-long holiday travelling either in China or southern Asia. We were advised by teachers and Chinese friends not to stay in China over the holiday as lots of Chinese people are travelling at that time to be at home with their families and many shops and restaurants close over the period. However, some people are planning to stay in China to travel to Harbin for the ice festival, Beijing, Xi'an, Shanghai and Chengdu as these cities are a long way away from Xiamen so difficult to get to during term time. 

From the warnings it seemed to me that a better option was to get out of China for a bit and go to other countries in Asia. I had originally hoped to go to Vietnam, Cambodia and Thailand but realised that that was a bit too much considering the time we have. My current plan is to go to Vietnam for almost three weeks with Alex and meet Chloe, a friend studying at Nanjing University, in Hanoi which is our first stop there. We plan to travel our way down the coast, stopping at cities along the way, to Ho Chi Minh where I will be for my 21st birthday. From there Alex will fly back to Xiamen as he is going home to Dubai and Chloe and I will fly to Chiang Mai in Thailand where we will spend some time before leaving the country and going back to China from Bangkok. I will have a day and a half in Xiamen before flying off again as I'm going to my cousin's wedding in Kathmandu, Nepal, for a week in February where I will see my family for the first time since September. Finally, my family and I will go to Xiamen so that I can start next semester and they can spend another week with me. 

I'm writing this in Hong Kong airport as we have a 6-hour stopover which isn't enough time to leave and go into Hong Kong so my journey's already started! Hong Kong airport has free WiFi which is great for keeping us amused during the long wait. Our flight from Xiamen left at 8:30am so we've been up since 5am having got to sleep at about 1am. We got up late after going out on Wednesday night so couldn't sleep! It's already been and will continue to be a long day... but hopefully worth it!