So, we are in Vietnam and have been for about a week and a half now. We crossed the border at Ha Tien- not a terrible ordeal, just a bit of a wait, but we did see a family get turned away for not having a visa. We came straight to the island of Phu Quoc (pronounced foo wok) and have been here since. Turns out we really like it here. It’s quiet and our little bungalow is about 3km from town in one direction and 3km from a sweet little beach in the other. We ride bikes everyday and everything just feels so…simple. Our first night here we stopped completely randomly at a food cart to eat dinner. Realizing we didn’t really know what we were doing or ordering the family who owned the cart taught us how to mix the seasonings and eat our food and have actually turned into what we now consider our “Phu Quoc family”. They are absolutely the sweetest people. The cart is owned by a mother (an AMAZING cook) and father who have 2 sons and 2 daughters. We have only met 3 of the children though as the 4th is at university in Saigon. They have introduced us to several different foods and drinks (including VIETNAMESE COFFEE which has to be in caps because that’s how you feel after you drink it!) and helped us with our Vietnamese which is an extraordinarily difficult language. We’ve been helping the older son with his English which we are realizing probably sounds to them how Vietnamese sounds to us- tonally hard to hear and pronounce. While we’ve mostly taken it easy here we have explored a bit. One night we went squid fishing- sadly didn’t catch any but ate well and had fun anyway! We also went on a snorkeling/fishing trip. We each caught a little fish, but it was too small to keep so we let it go. The snorkeling was interesting. Not a lot of fish but some great coral. The real shame is no one is careful about the coral and you can tell in a few short years it will probably start disappearing just like the Great Barrier Reef. Our biggest adventure was insane. SOMEONE (I wont say who) decided it would be a great idea to bike to the south of the island to Bai Sao, the white sand beach. This is approximately 29km one way mind you. So SOMEONE ELSE (again, not saying who) said we should take google maps route A because it was 1km shorter than route B. What followed was one of the most miserable bike rides of our lives. I think if we had proper mountain bikes and knew what to expect it could have been nice but we didn’t so it wasn’t. However, the beach was unbelievable. Pure white sand, clear blue water, and maybe 10-15 other tourists. Magical. We took route B back which was at least paved the whole way, but very hilly. We survived and have beautiful Corona-ad beach scenes in our memories. Today, our final day on Phu Quoc our family took the day off and invited us to the beach for “lunch”. We spent almost 5 hours with them eating and frolicking in the water. Mind you, when I say eating I mean we didn’t have dinner that night because we were so full from the massive meal they fed us. The day will truly live in our memories forever and we know there is no way we can ever thank them properly for the kindness they showed us. They are easily among the most caring, generous, kind people we have ever met. We head up into the Mekong tomorrow and, though we are sad to leave, we are excited for the adventure ahead. Love and miss you all! W&G
