Saigon

The Mekong Delta - Ariel and I in our lovely hats!
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Ho Chi Minh City is the largest of Vietnam's cities and the first encounter I had was crossing the road after getting off the bus from Cambodia.  Lets just say I am lucky to be alive!  Crossing the road in Saigon is an adventure all by itself, an adventure I learned to love.

I spent my time in Saigon with Yan and Naff exploring the cities museums and learning about Vietnams history.  I made an emotional visit to the War Remants Museum and although the museum is relatively one sided, it really showed me the brutality of war and that many of the victims in the war were civilians.  Scenes of torture and photos of children mangaled by US bombing and napalming will be forever engraved into my mind.

My roomies in Saigon - Yan and Naf.
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I also made a day trip to the Cao Dai Great Temple in Tay Ninh and observed the meditating monks before setting off to the Cu Chi Tunnels.  The Viet Cong made a network of narrow tunnels over a period of 25 years to protect themselves during the war.  We were shown the trapdoors which enabled the Viet Cong to make suprise attacks and even crawled through some of the tunnels ourselves.  A second day trip took me to the Mekong River Delta.  I took a boat trip through some of the countless canals and visited some of the sights along the way.