Mekong Delta

No more luxury, goodbye Hyatt.......our trip to the Mekong Delta starts at 7:45 when we are picked up by our tour guide and driver. After picking up another couple who booked the same tour, we drive for two and a half hours to XXX. The driver and guide unload the bikes and assemble them. Our first real exercise is about to start.We start cycling to a boat that will bring us to our first destination. After unloading the bikes from the boat, we start biking over small paths next to side rivers of parts of the Mekong. Lunch is served at a restaurant overlooking one of the 9 big splits (still a good mile wide) of the Mekong river. We are served grilled Elephant fish. The waitress shows us how to cut parts of the fish, put them on rice paper together with some herbs and fold them like a spring roll. With a little sauce, it is a great treat (not for Anna though, she gets the vegetables ;-). After lunch, we cycle another 15 kilometers to the ferry, to be picked up at the other side by our little van. A short drive takes us to the rice paddies. Cycling here, you really understand why the Mekong Delta is known as Vietnam's rice barn. Although the terrace style rice fields in China and around Sapa were stunning, the flat landscape filled with rice paddies is also great.

For dinner, we end up in one of the most touristic places in town on advice from our tourguide.....not the best advice. But French fries fried in fish oil is something special you should taste at least once in your life (trust me, once is more than enough).

Next morning, we visit the floating market of XXX. Since it is hard to describe, I've put in a slide show with pictures of the market (and the rest of the Mekong...PicasaWeb does not allow me to take only a few pictures from an album in a slideshow). The morning ends with another 15 kilometer bicycle ride. However, I decide to do another 5 with the guide into town to see how much a man can sweat in the burning sun ( a lot).
A quick shower in the hotel and we leave for the bus station to say goodbye. Mark and Lou-Ann are brought back to Saigon with the van while we continue our trip to Rachia with a Mailingh suicide express minivan.