Anyone Been to Vietnam?

[DeeZee]

Originally Posted by Fired Yo Momma

Too funny!!!! wow he was like that for a kids game just wait until the kids get older and the compitition get more crazy fists and boot stomping all over the pitch (pitch = field, Boots = Cleats).

My buddy works for the US post office and they hire all the old Nam vets. He says that the Nam mailmen hold the mail bags like they are back carrying their old M-16

He says that the Nam mailmen hold the mail bags like they are back carrying their old M-16

[BoingBoing]

Originally Posted by MTBMaven

I really want to see Angkor Watt in Cambodia too.

Sounds like your on the right track. Someone told me that Cambodia was the place to go. No wait, I got that from MIB II...

[Impy]

Originally Posted by MTBMaven

My wife and I are starting to plan for our big annual international trip for May or June. We are looking at South Africa, Vietnam, and India right now. Vietnam is the highest on my list because South Africa is just so expensive to get too (and takes forever to get there). I really want to see Angkor Watt in Cambodia too.

Hi maven

Yes I just got back from Vietnam in November. It was really great. I went on an organized cycling trip and we started in Saigon and ended in Hanoi. I can give you a lot more info if you want, feel free to PM me.

colette

[EMrider]

I've visited Vietnam twice. First time about 10 years ago and most recent trip was 2 years ago. Both visits were for business. That said, Vietnam and Turkey are my favorite countries to visit as a tourist. There is decent tourist infrastructure along the coasts, but not so much to remove the rustic charm. In the interior, it is a fascinating and very underdeveloped country. People are warm and friendly. In Saigon and especially Hanoi, the architecture is an interesting mix of French colonial and traditional Vietmanese. The cities are a zoo, but I like to explore and don't mind the crowds. If you are planning to cycle, like some adventure and don't mind roughing it a bit then IMHO you'll have a great time. I'm hoping to visit with my entire family sometime in the next two years.
R

[shudder]

I asked my pal Charles, and he wrote back the following long note about his experience over there. Hope you find it helpful:

Yup, we went just after 911. Lots of room on the plane, easy to get a hotel room. We did this trip:

http://www.adventurecenter.com/Imtrav/trip/savh

I don't think you'd find a better value out there. That's about the price we paid back then by the way. The trip i was on didn't go to whale island. They take you around lots of villages and cities between hanoi and saigon. Spend a few days just walking around hanoi. It's a wonderful city with lots to eat. The sofitel is reasonable and offers cooking classes as well. The water puppets are fun once but i never felt the urge to see them again. Visit the guild district where groups of workers craft glass and steel medicine cabinets, metal gates, watering cans, strip and rewind armatures from electric motors and just about everything you can imagine.

Watch out for the dream machines.

Not to be missed, the hanoi hilton, uncle ho's tomb and street cock fighting. We shot 45 rolls of film back when people shot film.

Watch out for slow moving ox carts.

You got to get used to entire schools emptying out to say hi as you ride by.

Watch out for overloaded buses teeming with humanity and live pigs stuffed into baskets for transport. Also, there will be lots of buses stopped on the hai van pass with holes where the motors used to be. Someone hitched a ride with it to the bottom of the hill for parts.

Watch out for 75 year old women who look like stick figures carrying about a thousand pounds of rocks on baskets on the ends of bamboo poles. They could kick your ass if they felt like it, so be nice to them.

Wat you name? Whea you from? Get ready to say something like hoa-key and bobo cause you do it a thousand times a day. (hoa-key means america and bobo is a lot easier to understand than charles) To them, you are like the travelling museum of cycling technology. Your bikes are probably better than their bikes. 90% of the country is younger than about 20.

Everyone is a bike mechanic. If something breaks they will find a way to get you rolling again. Somehow.

Enjoy the broiled dog head in the local markets. Have fun riding over everything drying on the road - rice, coffee, sugar cane - it's all left out there for crushing by whatever rolls by. Buses, bikes, cars, tuk-tuks, oxes, pigs. Oh and be careful for stuff in your rice...

Make sure your door latches and locks on the overnight train. Some stuff was pilfered the trip before ours. Generally, everything and everyone is lots safer and friendlier than here.

You have no hope of speaking the language. The word for beer is 'bai hoi'. It ranges in price from cheap to dirt cheap. It's about 5,000 dong for a liter. About 35 cents.

Scores of vendors will try to sell you everything from exotic rolex knockoffs to bottles of whisky with pickled cobras inside. The vietnamese for no is 'khong'. Be sure to bring lots of small denomination notes to buy stuff from the vendors to whom you just told, khong.

If it is possible, try to rent a scooter, or group of scooters, when you get to dalat to head out to visit the mnong minority people. They're kind of like our american indians, there before everyone else came and invaded. If you catch them during a celebration, there's always something to celebrate, say, your arrival, you will be invited to drink copious quantities of rice wine from vats with long straws. You won't leave thirsty. It is considered polite to make a small donation of a few dollars for 'education' or some such. Also be sure to break into some of the the abandoned french colonial mansions on the hill in dalat.

Buy some silk. It's some of the highest quality you'll find and it's cheaper than the beer. Hue is a great place for that.

Someday i'm going back. In fact i wonder why i left...

-charles


Enjoy,

shud

[ChariotsOfTires]

Originally Posted by MTBMaven

My wife and I are starting to plan for our big annual international trip for May or June. We are looking at South Africa, Vietnam, and India right now. Vietnam is the highest on my list because South Africa is just so expensive to get too (and takes forever to get there). I really want to see Angkor Watt in Cambodia too.

Spent a month in Saigon while in college, with a four day stop in Phnom Phen. Vietnam was awesome and really inexpensive. Our group of nine ate really well for really cheap. We stayed at the Peace Hotel in Saigon. Did a trip to the coast and went snorkeling in Nha Trang. Recommend both.
If you do go to Cambodia, fly there from Vietnam. The road from Siagon to Phnom Phen is like an 8 hour version of the Indiana Jones ride at D-land once you get into Cambodia. Its been awhile since I was there, so I'm sure some things have changed and the only bikes I touched while there was the motorized kind.
Happy Huntings!!!

[MTBMaven]

Many thanks Shudder (and Charles), Impy, EMrider, ChariotsOftires, and others who gave info. Some of the stories (especially all the stuff in the road for rolling over) remind me of our tour through Yunna (far southwest), China last summer. It was grain harvesting season and our bus was used to separate the grain. We would get inches from them as they through it on the road and then swept it up.

[ChariotsOfTires]

Originally Posted by MTBMaven

Some of the stories (especially all the stuff in the road for rolling over) remind me of our tour through Yunna (far southwest), China last summer.

What part of China is Yunna in. I spent a month in the city of Chung Sha in Hunan Province. Emp. Mao's beloved home was incredible. It's a mid-size city in China, boasting only 5 million people or so. Insanely large.

[MTBMaven]

Yunnan sorry not Yunna.

[Livepe]

Originally Posted by Fired Yo Momma

Go to thailand or bangcok but leave the wifey at home

I will keep my comments to myself.

I think you and your wife will have a wonderful trip wherever you decide to go. I have an India trip planned for later this year and can't wait.

[Liquid55]

Never been to Vietnam, but I was in Singapore last year and its beautiful. Great People and food, just don't spit, jaywalk, chew gum..... they are really strict about everything. I'd love to go there again. Stayed at the Shangri-La's Rasa Sentosa Resort on Sentosa Island.
http://www.shangri-la.com/en/propert...asentosaresort