The Mekong Delta day
A very long day because the Delta is at least two and a half hours from the hotel. Add the horrendous traffic and the rain on the way back and it was an eleven hour day for six of us in the van. An interesting sight was the number of work crews cutting the grass in the medians of the highways.

But worth the trip. Where else can you take a ride in a TukTuk, be rowed up the river in a four-seater canoe and cruise the delta in a river boat?

The first place was the usual ‘comfort’ stop which is always tied to a souvenir store, the second was the start of the tour – a local brickworks that uses mud from the river to mould the bricks and coconut remnants to fire the kilns. Walking through jungle paths we came to the coconut factory where they split the husks, extract the nuts, harvest the coconut meat and then use the waste as ground up fertilizer – everything used organically – impressive.

Then the river boat ride to the candy factory which uses the coconut meat to make various forms of coconut based candies. Naturally we bought a small sample for 50,000 dong – about $2.25cdn. Back on the boat we soon docked at a set of steps – no more clambering up rickety piers and walked to the ‘mat’ factory. Another tourist trap with good stuff. The object of this trip was to see how the bamboo sleeping mats, place mats and coasters are made – just like a carpet on a loom.

This boat trip was on a Mekong Delta tributary and had been, or still was in a limited capacity, an area of significant boat building. Boats on ramps and inside building facilities were still on the Delta banks. Also noted was the large number of crab traps. Set up to take advantage of the tides, the  fisherfolk would empty the nets at low tide after hoping to catch the crabs that walk on the banks at high tide.

The ride to the next boat was on a six seater ‘TukTuk’ basically a motor-cycle front end with a wide axled fixed platform that can be filled with people, goods and anything else that needs to be transported on small roads. Getting to the last boat we discovered that it was a four-seater rowboat paddled by the helmsman who stands up to paddle. Little rocky but still safe. This was the transport to the lunch. The lunch being the most impressive of the trip – two full sized cooked fish complete with heads and super big prawns, with the usual soup and rice; wonderful.

Back on the van only to be met halfway back by torrential rain, which was possibly a remnant of the typhoon, but unfortunately for some of the residents of HCMC it resulted in flooding as the high tide from the river crested at the same time so the storm drains backed up. This is a usual occurrence and the people live with it, but obviously don’t like it.