We didn’t want to fly from Ho Chi Minh City to Phnom Penh, so looked into the possibility of travelling along the Mekong by boat. We found a three day tour of Vietnam’s Mekong Delta, which ended with a four hour boat journey from Chau Doc to Phnom Penh.
We boarded the tour bus early in the morning, and started our journey down the national highway, while our guide, Duc, explained the plan for the rest of the day. After one stop to use the “happy room”, which seems to be the preferred term for toilet in Vietnam, we stopped suddenly by the Mekong and were led to a boat. The boat trip took us to An Khanh, where we sampled fresh fruits and honey tea. As we ate and drank, a traditional Vietnamese folk band played. They were great, and even finished with a rendition of Auld Lang Syne. Our next stop was for lunch, in an orchard garden on Tortoise Islet. The food was good and the lunch break gave us a chance to get to know some of the other people on the tour.
Our third stop of the day was at a family-run coconut business. They made loads of products from coconut, and we had the opportunity to see how they made ‘coconut candy’. It looked so good that we bought a (large) packet. It was amazing to hear how every single part of a coconut is used in some way; nothing is wasted. A few hours on the bus followed, and we spent the night in Can Tho. There wasn’t a great deal to see there, but the colourful riverside lights and oversized statue of Ho Chi Minh were worth a visit.
After a 6am breakfast, the second day of the tour began in torrential rain. We waded down the flooded streets to the riverside and boarded a boat that took us along the tributaries of the Lower Mekong. Our destination was Cai Rang floating market, where around one hundred boats sold fresh fruit & vegetables to local traders and hot tea & coffee to spectating tourists. After the market, the boat journeyed to a small dock, where we drank extremely strong Vietnamese coffee and watched vermicelli being made. Next up we all rented bikes and cycled to a bamboo ‘monkey’ bridge, which we took turns in crossing. Fortunately, nobody fell in! The rain had stopped by this point, and cycling on the muddy paths was fun.
Once back at Can Tho, we got on the bus for the 120km journey to Chau Doc. At this point, we said goodbye to some of our tour group, as they were on a two day tour ending in Ho Chi Minh City. Nearing Chau Doc, we stopped at an impressive Pagoda, outside of which were three large Buddha statues. As we departed, rain began to fall again. We saw a lot of rain in Vietnam, and none was heavier than this. Upon arrival at the entrance to Tra Su Cajuput forrest, we voted on whether the planned visit to the wild bird sanctuary would go ahead. I’m so pleased it did, as it was the highlight of the whole tour. A motorboat took us through a river of water lilies, before we swapped to a hand-rowed boat which navigated small canals amongst the mangrove forest. Along the way we were lucky enough to see several storks. As the motorboat took us back to the bus, the rain stopped and the sun reappeared. Typical!
That evening, Duc took everyone on the tour to a local restaurant. Wanting an authentic experience, we let Duc order. Like all Vietnamese food we’ve tried, it was excellent. With another early morning ahead of us, after dinner, we went straight to bed.
We sleepwalked our way to a small boat at Chau Doc to start day three. The boat took us to a fish farm, where Duc showed us how the fish are fed. He also explained that families build homes on the river if they can’t afford land in the cities, and also that a fish farm only lasts several years, after which the family running it has to move. The boat then continued to a Cham minority village, where we quickly browsed scarves and other souvenirs made there. Some people spent longer looking around the village as their tour ended back in Ho Chi Minh City, but we had to leave to catch a boat to Phnom Penh. We climbed from one boat to the other in the middle of the Mekong, and were on our way to Cambodia.
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