Mekong Delta boat trip

Hi All,

After a three day boat trip up the Mekong Delta, we have now arrived in Phnom Penh, the capital city of Cambodia. We have travelled on 7 different boats and covered 400km.

On the first morning, we were picked up from Ho Chi Minh city by mini-bus from where we were transported to the harbour in My Tho. On board the wooden motor boat, we travelled along the Mekong River passed fisherman’s stilt houses (half on land, half in water) and through the coconut palm lined river banks. Throughout the day, we stopped at many attractions, some slightly too touristy but all really interesting.

Donning our Vietnamese hats, we boarded a small rowing boat that took us to a seasonal fruit orchard. We were served rambutan, very yellow bananas, longan, pineapple, dragonfruit and water coconut. While we ate our fruit, we were played traditional southern folk music which included the Vietnamese classic ‘If you’re happy and you know it’.

Our next stop was at a small cocoa bean farm. It was really cool to try the flesh of the fruit that surrounded the coco beans inside the pods. There was very little actual fruit but the lychee like flesh did have a hit of chocolate. We tasted the bean at each stage of the processing. The bean itself was very bitter but the final chocolate was lovely and rich in flavour. Just next door was a small bee farm. To our amazement, our guide opened the hive with no protective gear and beckoned for us to gather round. He removed a section of honeycomb from the hive to show us the hundreds of bees. When he asked for someone to taste the fresh honey, Danielle volunteered without thinking. He then proceeded to poke her finger into the mass of bees, thankfully without being stung. After the demonstration, we were served delicious honey lemon tea as well as honeyed bananas and peanuts.

Our next stop was at a small coconut sweet factory. We watched the whole process of turning the fresh coconuts into the sticky toffee like sweets. Tasting included a variety of these naturally flavoured coconut sweets as well as some less enjoyable banana wine (more like grappa). The boys also gave snake wine a go that was literally made out of fermented snakes! Lunch was a huge, whole, deep fried, crispy elephant fish (given its name for the size of its fins which look like ears). We were shown how to make fresh spring rolls by taking sections of the fish and wrapping it in rice paper with salad, rice noodles and fresh herbs. After lunch, we went for a short bike ride through the village, passing coconut and bananas tress.

We arrived at our homestay for the evening in a small town outside of Can Tho. It was worlds away from the luxury city view apartment we had left behind in Ho Chi Minh city. Imy was less than impressed to be sharing her room with a whole host of wildlife: bats, mice and mosquitoes to name a few. For dinner we helped to roll the spring rolls before deep frying them. After yet another huge feast, we spent the evening playing cards outside our huts made from bamboo and banana leaves at the rivers edge - no fancy sky bar in this rural town!

While we were used to staying in basic accommodation and slept soundly, the same could not be said for the quality of Matt and Imy’s sleep! Luckily Imy isn’t grumpy like a tired Danielle. After breakfast, we travelled by boat to a local market before visiting the biggest floating market in the Mekong Delta. This wholesale market was so interesting. Traders could be seen loading sack fulls of fresh fruit and veg from large junk boats to smaller rowing boats - a different kind of shopping trolley for sure. We pulled up alongside a boat waving a pineapple from its flagpole so we could jump on board (luckily none of us falling in). We brought a pineapple that they cut into 4 ‘lollipops’ for us, it was defiantly some of the sweetest pineapple we’ve ever had.

Back on the boat, we travelled upstream to a rice noodle factory. We were shown how the rice is ground with water to form a paste, then steamed and dried on bamboo mats before it is put through a shredder to cut the noodles. There we tried a Vietnamese ‘pizza’ (fried noodles topped with spring onions and chilli sauce) which was surprisingly tasty.

In the afternoon, we stopped at a crocodile farm, here they are bred for their meat and leather. They ranged from juveniles to some that were longer than a car. At our next stop we boarded another rowing boat heading into Tra Su Cajuput flooded forest. Deep inside the mangrove jungle, we disembarked from the boat to climb up a viewing tower. From there, we had an incredible of the forest and could see birds flying in to roost on the canopy below. That evening, we travelled to Chau Doc and checked into our hotel for the night.

After breakfast the following morning, we travelled by speed boat to the Cambodian boarder crossing. It was certainly the strangest boarder we’ve ever encountered. The river side building was all but abandoned and felt eerily derelict. Finally someone emerged to check our passports then we travelled onwards by mini-bus to Cambodia’s capital - Phnom Penh.

We are pleased the weather has picked up now and we are back to enjoying hot sunny days. Sorry to rub it in for those of you back home.

Love R and D (plus M and I) xxx