Ho Chi Minh City- We survived!

I ordered a taxi from the airport to Ho Chi Minh city (Saigon) and in true Saigon fashion, he tried to rip me off! However, me being the savvy traveller knew how much it should cost and refused to pay him more. He eventually went off in a huff. I arrived at my hotel to be told by the hotel staff to be careful in Saigon and to keep your bag in front of you as bike thieves may try to steal your bag. Great start to Vietnam! I then met Lucy Watson in the hotel who had being staying here by herself for the last couple of days going on food tours and a tour of the delta. After chatting for like 3 hours we were hungry so went to get some food. It proved slightly difficult navigating the streets with motorbikes parked on the pavement and driving on the pavement and crazy drivers not stopping to let us cross at zebra crossings, all the while trying to keep our bags in front off us and watching to make sure no one was going to steal anything. This was still a step up from Nepal. We eventually came across the western party scene but we couldn't find anywhere else to eat so had dinner there. After which we chatted some more then went to bed.

The next day we started off by going to the art gallery which was really good. It showcased Vietnam art by Vietnamese artists and was housed in a lovely french building.

Then we headed to look at some of the french architecture at the theatre and town hall. We then had a nice coffee overlooking the chaos of the roundabout outside the theatre.

Then we went walked through a park and did some exercise on the outdoor equipment since had been a while.

After we walked to the Independence palace! This was a museum about the communist party and what happened during the war.

This took a while to look at. Lucy went to a water puppet show and then we went to dinner, had a wonder and then went back to the hotel to sleep.

Our final day and we started off seeing a vietnamese temple. Since we had both been to Japan we agreed that this now ruined all temples for us. it was nice but not amazing. So we headed for the War Remnants museum.

This museum depicted (rather biasedly)  the war against America. It was extremely interesting nevertheless and I learnt a lot about the Vietnam war (or the American war if you are in Vietnam) This took most of the day.

After, we wandered to a hindu temple which explained hinduism to us.

We then walked to the skybar and had a really expensive orange juice where they then ripped us off as they couldn't do maths. No matter how much we explained they were wrong we were just ignored. But the views were awesome.

We then went for dinner and back to our hotel but along the way Lucy insisted on taking pictures of the hospital we saw to show her brother (who's a doctor) how awful it was.

I think we both agreed that it was an interesting place even though it was dirty and unsafe and we were glad we visited but we were also glad we had each other and we probably wouldn't go back.

We survived Ho Chi Minh City...Just! Next stop Dulat.