The Mekong River, Vietnam – Saigon Day 2 – March 23rd

Joani and I took a tour bus about an hour and a half away from Saigon (which is on the Saigon River) to the mighty Mekong, to a point about 15 km upstream from its delta. It’s quite muddy from all the silt that washes off the fields, rice paddies and jungles on its 4800 km journey to the South China Sea.

On the way we stopped at a Buddhist temple (seems to be obligatory on every tour now). We saw yet another reclining Buddha, depicting him a state of total relaxation and bliss upon achieving Nirvana.

River boats on the Mekong in Vietnam all have eyes painted on the front, as if they were crocodiles. Tradition or superstition has it that this brings good luck, or keeps actual crocodiles away, or something like that.

The river here is spanned here by an 8 km suspension bridge that was completed 8 years ago.

We crossed the river in a typical river boat to visit a farm on a 12 km long island.

After seeing bee hives, we had honey and pollen tea that was out of this world (and I normally don’t like tea). They poured hot green tea over a mixture of honey and pollen with just a touch of kumquat.

They of course sold locally produced pollen

Here is Joani with a kumquat, which flavors tea similar to the way lemon does

Then we had a snack of locally grown fruit: mango, pineapple, jack fruit, longan (a litchi-like fruit), and dragon fruit. My favorite was the jack fruit (below), which was very sweet and somehow tasted like banana crème pie.

Then we took a sampan ride through narrow waterways lined with cocoa trees:

Finally, an excellent Vietnamese lunch of river fish, pork and rice, rice-paper eggrolls, river shrimp, sticky rice, and a vegetable-and-rice-noodle soup.

Then back across the Mekong on our river boat and onto the bus and back to our floating hotel. The most impressive building of the Saigon skyline was this new and modern 68 story office and condo spire. A major tenant is Ernst & Young (EY).

Tonight we set sail for Hanoi. It’s more than 1000 km to the north, so we have a day at sea on the way. This is good, as Joani is still sorting her Angkor Wat pictures. So much to do, so little time.