Boat Trip on the Mekong Delta
Trip Start
Nov 14, 2011
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17
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Trip End
Oct 31, 2012
Mekong Delta, Vietnam
Friday, December 16, 2011
For our last stop in Vietnam we wanted to visit the Mekong Delta. The Mekong Delta is the region in southwestern Vietnam where the Mekong River approaches and empties into the sea through a network of tributaries.
We booked a tour so it required us to take a morning bus that left Ho Chi Minh City (HCMC) at 8:30 a.m. The bus took an hour until we reached the area where we would take a boat to go to My Tho (the start of the Mekong Delta). The area's economy is based on tourism, fishing and the cultivation of rice, coconuts, bananas, mangoes, longans and citrus fruits. Our tour would be focusing on visiting some of the villages that supply these items. The boat we took held about 30 people and once we arrived, local Vietnamese women were ready to sell the practical straw conical hats to shield you from the sun. It’s funny but by the end of the tour, it seemed that whenever we made our stops, more of the travelers within our group were now sporting these straw conical hats. I guess they do work!
Amongst our travellers was a Russian couple who purchased items throughout our many stops. It was a bit ironic to watch Russians purchasing items made in a Communist country with US dollars. In our travel stops, we did come across many Russian tourists. We learned that the Russians were frequent visitors as travellers to fellow Communist countries. For the Vietnamese due to this close relationship, we found out that they were required to learn Russian in school. Now the predominant second language being taught is English. From a Vietnamese perspective, it must be difficult as there is an expectation that most Vietnamese should understand either Russian, French or English depending on who the traveler is and due to the history of the country with the various foreign powers either helping and/or occupying the country. Somehow the Vietnamese seem to work it all out and keep all us travellers happy.
Our tour stopped at various islands where the locals were either fishing in the Mekong Delta, showing us how rice can be made into rice paper wraps, coconuts transformed into kitchen utensils and other gadgets, coconut candies, harvesting of exotic fruits and honey making. The tour did provide us an opportunity to see how some of the Vietnamese live in the area. The homes we saw on the islands are very simple, one room homes. The area appeared a bit poorer with hard working people making their living off the river and islands. The river is their lifeline as they use it to move their produce and wares to sell at the floating markets. Unfortunately we didn’t get to witness the floating markets as the tour we were on did not include this item (Lesson Learned – Re-read and ask more questions to understand what you actually signed up for). One of the highlights of the tour was the fabulous lunch we had at a local restaurant on one of the islands –Ben Tre. They served us a fish dish that was nicely prepared (see photo below). The server prepared rice paper wrap rolls with the fish, lettuce, basil and cucumbers. It was very refreshing and delicious for a hot day. Another highlight was the row boat ride on the small creeks that run into the Mekong River Estuary.
After the tour we headed back to HCMC by bus and got ready as we were leaving Vietnam the next day. Our next stop is Cambodia.
