Travelogue: 5d/4n in Ho Chi Minh (Saigon) - Weird MyTho Tour

We had a blurrish day 3.  Bus-ferry-sampan-ferry-motorboat-bus.  Like that la... It was a tour to My-Tho also known as the Mekong Delta if not mistaken.  It was blurrish probably cause it started off pretty bad and whatever happened afterwards, I wasnt really interested.  :p

To begin with, mom & I were shooed out of the breakfast room at 7:30am by the tour guide of the day who kept complaining that we were VERY late.  I took out the itinerary to show him that it was stated 7:45am. He just kept repeating.. "Lots of pick up.  We are late" ...  and said that the itinerary is wrong.  I was like, is that my problem?  Down right rude.  We practically have to stop eating halfway.  Goodness me.  To cut long story short, the tour guide has been suspended for a month.  Apparently a lot of tourists complained about him.  Sigh.... Really don't understand why did he do that.  Life already so hard in Vietnam.

We proceeded with the trip to MyTho after the earlier unfortunate session.

Saw a KFC along the way.  Mom & I tried later in the evening.  It tasted different.  Not as yummy as those in Malaysia.

Again, still in awe with the morning traffic.

There are lots of stalls like this selling sandwiches in French loaf.  Didnt try cause the weather there was freaking hot and they dont store their cheese in fridge. 

Getting onto the Ferry to go visit some islands.  I seriously dont know what we visited cause I dont understand the words coming out from the tourguide. :p  There were some Vietnamese tourists too that joined our group.  So most of the time, the tour guide speaks only Vietnamese.  Hehehehe....

The river is really wide and huge.  Brownish water as seen here in the pictures.  No fish.  :p  This is their main mode of transport back in those days a long time ago.

The Vietnamese hat I owned for less than 15 minutes.  Luckily still got this photo.  The moment after this photo was taken, it flew off into the river. 

Our rude tourist guide.  Don't know what's his name.

A bridge in the distance which look so similar to our Penang Bridge.

Arrived at an island 15minutes later and was herded to a small cafe.

There, we were served honey + bee pollen drink with some peanut cookies which we have in our own country.  Didnt drink cause:

(1) It dont look hygienic.

(2) I am allergy to honey.

Mom said it was not too bad.  After the free sample, we were asked if we are interested in buying some home... hehehe... Since no one was interested, we were brought to another small cafe nearby.

In the second cafe, we were served tea and some 'exotic tropical fruits' - pineapples, papaya, honey dew.  :p.  Besides all that, we were also treated to some melodious songs sang by these Vietnamese girls...  The little girl above is so sweet looking.

I was wondering then, hmm... what are we suppose to buy now?  Exotic fruits?  Or perhaps tea?  Hehehehe

After performance was over, they left a hat for tips in the middle of the cafe.  No, no need to buy fruits or tea, just tips...  :p

From there, we walked thru a small orchard to get to a small river.  There, we got into one of the many sampan. 

We were then transported out to the earlier jetty where the ferry dropped us all off.  Seriously, I really don't know why were we doing all that...lols. Probably to see river.  I don't know...hehehehe.... no explanation nothing.  Just being herded from one place to another.

We got onto the ferry from the sampan and was brought to another island.  If not mistaken, they called it the coconut island.  On that island, we walked for quite a distance to get to a small road.  There, we hopped on to a waiting horse carriage.  Say say only horse carriage, but then again, can consider one also la... but it is of the simplest form.  No roof nothing.  The seats were metal.  Imagine how it felt sitting on a piece of metal that has been under the hot sun whole afternoon.  Yep, ouch!  Lols..I tell you arr... I seriously dunno what they were thinking lor.. or what's the purpose of it all..

Some kids in the village.  The whole family just gathered under the trees with mats, hammock and all.  I don't know why.  They stays there maybe.  I really don't know.

Throughout, no time to take photos also.  This is just one of the rare moment.  Oh, no toilet break too.  Lols.... like detention camp like that....

After the horse carriage, we walked on towards a coconut/peanut candy factory. Our tourguide explained a little here and end the explanation with... "you can buy these freshly made candies to bring back.."  Hahahaha....Totally unbelievable.. 

From there, we got onto yet another boat.  And this time round, motorised ones.  Saw this kid swimming in the river.  Also witness a dare devil who speeded it's boat so fast along the curvy river and hit a bridge.  Some tourists in that boat was injured.  They were from a different group.

We were brought to a restaurant nearby for lunch.  It was already 2pm then.  Before we were served, they brought out a fish dish called 'deep fried elephant fish' to see if we want to order it for extra.  Nobody ordered.  Only after that we were all served lunch.  Really simple lunch.  Another Malaysian couple who were also on the same tour as us apparently have different menu.  VIP menu they said because their itinerary said so and their package were much more costlier than us.  When they were served, it was that 'deep fried elephant fish' dish.  We really cant believe it.  All of us felt they served that cause nobody wanna buy.  That's why...lols

I was so glad when we finally got back on the bus heading back to the hotel.  Really tak boleh tahan lor..  Slept all the way back into the city.  As we were all snoozing peacefully, was awaken abruptly to "Wake up, wake up.  Dont sleep anymore.  You all get down here..".  I opened my eyes and looked around and asked... 'We too? Here?' and he said, 'yeah yeah.. everyone.'... I was really pissed by then.  Instead of dropping us off at the hotel like how it should be, he dropped us off in the middle of nowhere.  Goodness.  We were like really really dont believe it lor... But luckily I somehow got my bearings la...roughly know where our hotel is... still quite a distance to walk.  Pity the others.

Took some pictures as we walked 'lormantically' (romantic) back to our hotel.  Throughout the walk, we just couldnt believe what had happened.  Though very unsatisfying, in a way, it was pretty hillarious also la...  It is like, the fella must have something wrong in his head... wonder why he became a tour guide in the first place.  We summed it up as maybe he misses his wife too much.  Cant wait to get rid of us.  My goodness... lols...

That night, we went to explore another shopping mall and after that, walked over the Ben Thanh Night Market again.  Basically, most of the malls are situated pretty much the same area.  Walkable.  From the market, we took a cab back to the hotel and guess what, yours truly have to show the driver how to get to our hotel cause he drove us to somewhere else which he thought was where we wanna go.  Sigh... mom said he pretend pretend one so can let the meter run longer.  To me, whatever la... I got no energy d...

There you have it, our horrid yet interesting day 3!