Culture vultures

After a lovely first meal in Saigon and an early night in what might be the comfiest bed I have ever slept in, I woke Nick up by opening the blackout curtains to glorious (blindingly bright) sunshine at 7am on Saturday morning. I was in the bad books for a while after that. Thankfully we had a brilliant breakfast, a lot of coffee, and a private car waiting at the front door of the reception to help lessen the pain.

Disappearing into the hidden tunnels 

The first portion of our day was to be spent an hour or so away at the Co Chi Tunnels. The network of tiny tunnels (really tiny – no wider than the length of Nick’s foot) were created by the Vietnamese during the war with America, and as the main tool that resulted in the Vietnamese victory during the war, it was definitely worth the trip to take a look around the exhibition that are now open for tourists to visit.   

            The tunnels were tiny and terrifying, although they themselves were not as grim as the numerous traps and weapons that were on display. Pits with hidden trapdoors and cages, holes that were designed to grab soldiers with giant spikes directly into the armpit or thigh and scatter bombs that had been handmade in underground pits, the displays were real eye-openers! It was graphic, vicious and not the sort of thing that you would want to spend more than a brief morning looking around. It was incredibly interesting though – those American soldiers didn’t stand a chance!

            Having made it around the tunnels without getting caught out in any legacy traps, we then stopped in briefly to learn about the manufacture of Vietnamese lacquer art work (I'm not sure why - our driver just thought it was a great idea) before we headed back to the hotel for a quick cool down (the temperature in the jungle was pretty spectacularly sweaty) before we started out for our afternoon adventure.               

Learning about lacquer 

The rest of our day was then spent wandering around the town. We took a tour around the fabulous streets, in their bizarre blend of European architecture and completely Asian street life. We went to the huge and slightly overwhelming markets and we found a fantastic street food restaurant to stock up on a delicious pho and plenty of water to power us through the rest of our trip.

Hanging out with the locals 

Ho Chi Minh - the city of mopeds! 

Pho - breakfast for the Vietnamese, lunch for me! 

By five o’clock we were back at the hotel, showered and changed and ready for a cocktail to mark the Five O’Clock Follies tradition. Then dinner was at a fabulous French restaurant called Le Jardin, where we ate pate, steak and apple tart out in a glorious French courtyard. It felt just like the south of France (only hotter) and we dreamed that we were back in Europe whilst working our way through some fabulous wine until we were the last ones left at the restaurant and the staff practically begged us to leave.

Five O'Clock Follies cocktails on the roof 

We wandered back to the hotel, stopping at one more French bar (opposite) for a final glass of wine we returned to the cosy comfort of the worlds most amazing bed after a long day out in Saigon!