Today is a free day in Ho Chi Minh City. We had the option of a trip to the Mekong Delta, but this was an 8 hour excursion starting at 8am. Whilst we would have loved to have gone, we weren’t sure if we’d cope in the heat for 8 hours (our sun cream having been confiscated during our last air flight as I forgot to put it in the main bag, that rule is still bullshit), and we wanted to get a bit of a look around the city on our own which we wouldn’t have been able to do if we had gone for the trip. This was our last day in Ho Chi Minh City and our last day in Vietnam.
Having decided against the excursion we got up late, too late for breakfast, and set off to have a bit of a poke around. We found our way back to the area where the opera house lives as we’d been told that was where the main action was shopping-wise. We blundered into a shopping centre which had a sort of Debenhams feel about it (straight into the perfume counters) though it wasn’t Debenhams as that was just up the road. Actually. Upstairs we found a wee supermarket so we picked up some more sun cream and a big bottle of water to take around with us, and set off from the shopping centre without having too much of a look around.
Back on the main streets we found the road with all the posh shops on it, Gucci and what have you. We didn’t bother looking, there really wasn’t much point. Having looked around for a bit we made our way to the riverside hoping to be able to get close and check out the scenery. Unfortunately they’ve built up stuff along the river to the extent that you can no longer get close enough for a butchers, but later Rafa tells us there isn’t actually much to see anyway. After turning down several bike rides, boat trips, motorbike hiring and sunglasses salesfolk (both of us clearly already wearing sunglasses) we had a little sit down in the shade to hide from the sun a little. We sat and relaxed for a bit, and a few boat trip denials later we wandered off back towards the city centre. We again rested in the shadow of a nearby monument (not sure what of, nothing in English) before deciding it was time for lunch.
Being the cultural folk we are we dived into an Italian cafe for lunch. Think Costa (ish) with a touch of “upstairs in Miles bar” (pretty much just a Ramsgate reference that one, sorry) up on the third floor where the loos where. We had a couple of iced coffees and I, trying to reclaim some local credibiliy, had a won ton soup, Mrs Tom having a more culturally damning burger and chips. It was a very comfortable lunch and it was great to be out of the heat for a while. Tired from the heat and feeling a little drained we retired back to our hotel for a smashing little afternoon nap.
Having been blessed with our fancy bath (dolphin tap and jacuzzi bubbles) we took a nice long soak before meeting Gaynor, Barry and Rafaele for dinner, Steven and Darren having gone out on their own, and Summer opting for room service. As we’d not seen a note left for us earlier we were actually planning on going for a dinner on or own, but Rafaele gave us a call to le us know we were late so we toddled off to join the others.
We ate dinner beside the market stalls at a street food place Rafa recommended, and though I was a little aprehensive at first (it didn’t look massively clean and I was a tadge concerned about rats if I’m honest) we ended up having a good meal, and a bit of a lesson in politics to boot. Though it was street food we ordered from a menu and Rafaele insisted that it was all freshly cooked to order. It was certainly very tasty, and I’m not dead so it’s probably fine.
No after dinner drinking action for us tonight as an early start beckoned with us needing to be packed and ready to leave at 7:30, and we still needed to pack. So, it was pack the cases and get to bed.