Cruise To Cambodia

I have got a ticket to take the 2 days 1 night trip to Phnom Penh, Cambodia from Ho Chi Minh. The journey takes me to a small village called Vinh Long. I visited the some floating market, small fish paste making factories, "keropok" making factory and a market. We were taken by a long boat for to visit the floating village. Fishermen and people whom are living just on the boat, a floating home. They are traders and the boats will hang the item they trade on a pole for other to identify. You will see a different tradition here, and each and every one of them are dependent on the mother river, Mekong.

From there we were taken to another small town called Chou Doc. The group has decreased from 40 pax to only 7. I am the only Asian on the group. Rest are from europe and a old couple from Australia. I realized that backpacking is not an interest to Asians. But other do realize that they learn and see the real world this way, mixing with the people at the ground level. I had to stay in a small motel. It looked like a shop lot converted to a hotel, but I was confident that it would probably be one of the best in the town. Nothing to grudge. A good night sleep after a long day.

In the morning, I was late. Rest of the people were already waiting for me, the group now has only 5 pax. An omelet sandwich and a coffee, take away. Reached a small dock. From there we were on a long boat which could accommodate about 20 pax. About 20 minutes to the other side of the river. and then we arrived at a small canal. 3 small boats were already there waiting to take us. Now, this ride was awesome . They took us through some small villages along the canal. KIds and people waving at us. I was told by the Guide that 99% chances are that they have never left the place, even up to any bigger town nearby. We arrived at a part of the Mekong River where a lots houses were floating, now this looked like real houses and were built using plastic and steel floats. What they do? they rear fish in the Mekong water. A big tank with wires are built underneath each floating house.

Next was the big thing, myself with 4 other backpackers were transferred to another long boat. Destination - Cambodia. From Chou Doc, It was close to 8 hours long boat ride. After about an hour, we arrived at the boarded station of Viet. Had a meal and waited for the passports to be returned. It was quite modern with a small cafe inside. Then it was the customs of Cambodia. Some of the foreigners were stranded. My Malaysian Passport kept me going, but they did give me a different look. I believe they have not seen a Malaysian Passport holder crossing this way for a very long time. People along the river are probably 60-70 years backwards. The boat ride goes until a town called Neak Loeang. From there is was a 1 hour drive to Phnom Penh.

Hotels in Phnom Penh are cheeper than HCM. Actually everything is less expensive in PP compared to HCM from food to transports. Don't bother changing your currency to local cash. USD is preferred and accepted everywhere. If you tend to change to local currency, you will loose quite some money. Again Phnom Penh have some very nice places to visit. It is a small city by development probably something like Ipoh. I stayed there for another 3 days before flying back to Kuala Lumpur. Compared with HCM, Phnom Penh is up in my list for a second visit in future.

3 Days in Ho Chi Minh

I was planning a short trip to Ho Chin Minh. The largest city in Vietnam typically know as Saigon. It is a very nice city, and there are lots of things that you can do here. I did my hotel shopping on Agoda. I got a great deal at a decent hotel very near to the center area in HCM, Hoang Lian Hotel. It is about 10 minutes walking distance from the famous Ben Tanh Market. Along the same street, you find lots of good budget hotels with great deals. My advice, buying online and as early as possible will get you the best room at the right price. Most of these hotels provide so called breakfast. Forget the continental or american breakfast, this will be purely Vietnamese. You are lucky if you get some bread and butter. WiFi is offered free in most hotels.

Getting out of the place was easy. You can rent a bike for USD 4-5 per day. Remember you will need International License to ride it around. However even the rental guy will not ask for one. You only need to worry about this if you are caught by police. But it is always "negotiable". From here if you walk 10 minutes to Pham Ngu Lao, you will find a whole street full of backpackers hotel and tourist agents. Now, the hotels here are designed to cater backpackers. So if you don't mind the simplicity and privacy is not an issue to you you probably will like this place. But for a bout extra USD 2-5 you will be able to get a nice room on your own at other places. So do your math.The good thing about this area is that it offers you lots of options for traveling further to other parts of Vietnam and Cambodia. They have the 2 days, 3 days and up to a week tour for Mekong Delta trips, to the villages on the south and to through Mekong to Phnom Penh Cambodia. I will come to that latter. You will also find lots of restaurants here, from Chinese, Indian, Vietnamese and Western. But for me, the food prices here are much more expensive compared to what I can get in Malaysia.

You will get lots of good information on places to visit in Ho Chin Minh online, just google it. So I am not going to elaborate on that. My idea is to share information from experience that may be different from those standard picture given. For Malaysians, you may want to change your RM to Viet in Kuala Lumpur. RM does not have big value here so you may loose big on changing it here. USD is okay. There is a nice Mariamman temple in the middle of the city. But it will be quite different, with prayers and practices are very much redesigned to Viet. You will also see people wearing sandals and shoes inside the temple. To make things easier grab a free city map at the airport. Most of the main Tourist attractions are there. Take the bus to the city centre from the airport, they know the normal places where tourist will get down (hotel areas).

I did one of the HCM River Cruise. It was USD 15. The food was not great but the experience is. You will board the cruise ship at 7.30 PM if I am not mistaken. Please check the schedules again. It will leave the dock and return to the same dock in about 1.5 hours to 2 hours time. Please note that there are few companies running this river cruise. Price differs slightly and also different ships boarding from different dock. The drinks including alcohol on board is very expensive and the food portion is very small. There will be daily traditional shows as well. Again do this only if you want to experience the ship. There are few specific shops that sells model ships and boats made from wood in HCM. You can get a 80cm long ship for USD 25. Bargain hard. I find the model ships to be a HCM specialty.

After visiting many places in Ho Chin Minh, I decided to take some risk. Cross over to Phnom Penh, Cambodia by taking the long way - a boat ride in my next post!