If in the late night, the area where the hotel was felt like a ghost town, it was the exact opposite as soon as the sun rose. The streets were full of people. Houses beside the hotel were eateries similar to our very own carinderia. The main street was full of people. And I guess we were all surprised by the sea of motorcycles we saw when we crossed an intersection. It felt like a motorcycle attack. Hahaha!
One good thing about this trip is that everyone followed the itinerary we prepared. Hehe! There was no difficulty in getting people to wake up at 630AM even if we only had a couple of hours sleep. And when one says it's time to go, all the others follow. Hehe!
Our itinerary for the first day was a Mekong river tour. We got the tour from Sinh Travel. It's one of the most popular tour operators I think because when we reached their office, there were already a lot of fellow tourists waiting. The tour we got was a whole-day trip that entailed a two hour trip to the town of My Tho where we boarded the boats.
Our cruise included a trip to a rice paper factory, coconut handicraft manufacturers, bee farm, orchards, and a coconut candy factory. Then there was also lunch at the Phoenix island followed by a trip to a local village where we were entertained with traditional Viet music.
I guess my favorite part was the banca ride along the creeks. It felt like being transported back to several decades ago. Hehehe!
The tour ended around 4 or so and we were back in HCM by 6. After resting a bit at the hotel, we headed out for a taste of Vietnam night life. Our first stop was Quan An Ngon (138 Nam Ky Khoi Nghia St., Dist. 1) for dinner. It was obviously one of the most popular restaurants because of the number of people who were there when we arrived. Quan An Ngon looks like an old French-style village. There are wooden tables and chairs, some banana trees, and a bar. Service was really quick, too. We didn't wait that long to get a table. Our orders arrived rather quickly. And the food was really enjoyable.
After dinner, we decided to take a walk to a nearby Trung Nguyen Coffee shop. But after walking for several minutes, we couldn't find the shop. When we did find it, we all had a good laugh because it turns out that the reason we missed the shop was that it was already closed. Haha!
So instead we went to Lush (Ly Tu Trong Street- District 1) for drinks and dancing. I really loved the place. The crowd was relatively young. There was a good mix of locals and tourists. And it kind of reminded me of Government, Jill's and Embassy. Hahaha! I met a Thai guy named Golf but I was stupid enough to be stupid at the wrong time. But I was amused by the whole dynamics of whatever it was. Hehe! It was okay. The 100,000 dong door fee gets you two Tiger beers. The drinks are a bit pricey though, but it still is a must visit.
We left by 1AM. Tey and I were still in the mood for some more partying so we headed to Apocalypse Now (2C Thi Sach), The place was bigger and much more crowded compared to Lush, but I felt more at home at Lush, if you know what I mean. Tey and I went back to the hotel by 2AM. Next, a trip to the Cu Chi Tunnels and a very wet afternoon city tour.
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