Howdy folks!

Last email from Vietnam and I have just spent a really cool and chilled three days in the Mekong Delta. It is a fascinating and beautiful area to visit and as yet not entirely taken over by tourists...Even the locals have yet to learn how to rip off tourists so at the moment it's totally relaxed and friendly. The children are the cutest things and they line the river banks shouting "hello" and waving...makes you feel like royalty...we met a few of the kids in the towns we stopped at and they walk with you holding your hand and babbling away in Vietnamese and smiling all the time it's just joyous.. I wanted to bring them all with me (and that takes some saying from maternal 'ol me!!)

Our first day was spent journeying there about three hours from Saigon and then we visited a kind of jungle type area called Rung Tram Forest which was a VC stronghold during the war. These tenacious Vietnamese even built underwater shelters!! They were built in to the rivers and waterways and were built to house 10 Vietnamese under water in dry conditions!!! We took these tiny paddle boats around the foresty jungle area and paddled under low hanging trees and canopy and through the water hyacinths around the area...it was blissfully quiet and I never knew there were so many shades of green as there are in the Delta...we were warned about the very friendly mosquitoes there too (Hurrah for Lucy and her repellent!) After the boat trip it was time for lunch in the jungle and then back on the bus to Long Xuyen City and onto our hotel stopping off to take ferries across the Upper and Lower Mekong.

We stayed the first night in Chau Doc close to the Vietnam/Cambodia border...(no ice cream there and a broken shower...) The next day we went on another boat trip to visit some floating houses in Chau Doc town. It was great being rowed around this floating "town" all the kids were waving and calling to us..

Then it was time to say "cheerie" to Harry and Lucy literally in a rowing boat on the Mekong. They were rowed to their boat that would be taking them to Cambodia and departed off down the river and we rowed back to land to hop on the bus to move on to Sam Mountain. (well "mountain", it was 250m high and only took half an hour to climb so not really a mountain if you base it on Nepali standards anyway!!). From the top you can see the Mekong Delta and Vietnam on one side and on the other is Cambodia.. and for a few cigarettes as a bribe you can go up to the army post look out from there....Sadly it was cloudy so the views weren't that great. After lunch we moved on and went to an incense making factory... thoroughly boring but it broke up the journey. We also visited some temples along the way and then made it to Can Tho for the night. This is a great place by the riverside and we had some fab food there and took a stroll around. (They had a shower that works and Cornettos! - this is how to gauge a fine Vietnamese town!!) Interestingly enough I had to share my room with a Japanese bloke who spoke no English and for some bizarre reason after returning to the hotel after dinner there was a packet of 5 condoms in the room all of which expired in 2001!!!! Not too sure whether I was meant to take that as a compliment or an insult but it did make one smile (and for any of you dirty buggers, there were still 5 out of date condoms in the room when I left in the morning!!)

Can Tho has a statue of Uncle Ho in the middle of the town and it looks just like the Tin Man from the Wizard of Oz !! Day three was spent for most of the day on a boat trip around the Delta taking us through the smaller waterways and gently making our way back towards our bus to bring us back to Saigon.. We visited a floating market at Cai Rang in the morning and the locals attach their produce to long bamboo poles sticking up like masts from their boats advertising what they sell. It was wicked. Spent the whole day waving at more Vietnamese kids and people who passed us by and after all that waving yours truly managed to have a totally chilled cat nap on top of the boat much to the hilarity of the staff...they had to wake me up when we were approaching the police station as apparently foreigners are not meant to go on the top of boats as it's not deemed safe??? Eh? We also did the obligatory visit to a rice noodle making factory..dull as dishwater! There isn't a vast amount of "sights" per se to visit in the Delta but just looking at life there and the scenery was a totally perfect way to finish off the journey through Vietnam.

Anyway I am now back in Saigon where it is raining and not so warm (only around 24 degrees) so the plan for some tom foolery in the Saigon Water Park (which is apparently as un Vietnamese as it gets) is off!!! I have had a blast and would thoroughly recommend a visit. The people are so amazingly friendly and the cities are joyously chaotic, the beaches are perfect, the coffee is AMAZING and as yet it is relatively un-spoilt although that is changing rapidly as tourism takes off...Vietnam is definitely my second favourite country so far but unable to knock Nepal off top slot but I suspect that'll take some beating!

Now it's time to head off to Bangkok and see Kate and do a spot of investigating around there for a while...well I don't have to be in Singapore for my next flight until 23rd December so plenty of time for visits to Myanmar, Laos and Cambodia en route....

Finally, my smarty pant bro has now put a photo gallery of my photos of Vietnam on my website so check it out....Any of you seen the bungy jump??

So I will say bye for now,

loadsa love

Lisa / Lillie

xxxx