I admit I made a mistake. I can't help but want to plan everything to get good deals. But booking in advance leaves you locked into a location. And unfortunately, we were locked into 5 days in Ho Chi Minh City (aka Saigon). We arrived in the evening to find ourselves on the loud backpackers party street. Our hotel had no window (ugh) and even still we could hear a soft boom, boom, boom from the music outside. Oh well, we just needed to make the best of it.
We were frustrated about being in HCMC, so why not start off our first day with a massage. It was becoming a habit of ours! We spent two of our five days relaxing, catching up on Game of Thrones, trip planning in coffee shops and wondering the streets.
We saw all the main sites in the city in one morning. The War Remnants Museum was a sad but interesting look into the Vietnam/American War. The Notre Dame Cathedral built by the French was pretty but closed for the day. The historic post office was beautifully designed but it was just a building. We roamed the Ben Than market and I enjoyed browsing but I wasn't planning to buy. The constant panhandling from the stall owners turned us off from walking around too long.
We had enough of the city so we did a day tour on the Mekong River. We took a boat to two of the small islands. On one island, locals took us around on small boats through the canals. It was a bit touristy but it was nice to get out of the city for a bit and see how people live along the Delta. We also did a morning tour to the Cu Chi tunnels. To hide from Americans, locals lived within the tunnels. The Viet Cong also used these tunnels to trap and kill American soldiers. We got to crawl through one of of small tunnels and quickly realized that they were not made for Americans! I always like to learn about history of a country and this tour could have been really interesting. Unfortunately, the area was slammed with tourists and it was really rainy.
Needless to say, when the time came to head to the airport and leave HCMC, we were excited!
