Mekong and beyond

After a couple of days in HCMC we packed our bags once more for the last section of our Vietnam trip. We planned to travel southwest to Ben Tre and then follow the Mekong north to the Cambodian border giving ourselves a few days to stop along the way and meet the locals.

In Ben Tre we got a small motor boat up the Mekong taking us up the smaller canals through villages, passing men and women fishing off the ends of their boats. It was a great introduction to the area. We stopped for lunch at a tiny restaurant and had the most amazing fish. Jill and I then hopped on a couple of bikes and took a ride through the villages of the area receiving smiles and waves from everyone we saw. For some reason the old ladies love me!

After an hour on the bikes we were back on a boat and back to Ben Tre. From here we travelled to Can Tho famous for it's floating markets. The following morning we were up at 6 to get to the market to see it in full swing. It was great, they were busy haggling with each other and trading bananas for pineapples or sweet potatos for mango, each boat had a tall pole at the front with whatever they were selling hanging from it. We then again headed into the smaller channels of the river to a village which had amazing fruit orchards growing all the things we had just seen being sold.

After no time at all we were off again north to the town of Chau Doc, our last stop before we hit the border. We thought it would be nice to slow the pace a little and enjoy a relaxing last day soaking up the last of Vietnam. Our relaxing day ended up being the day we climbed a mountain in the midday sun (not recommended). However from the summit we could just about see Cambodia away in the distance. On our way back down Sam Mountain we stopped, hopped in a couple of hammocks and admired the view with a cold drink, it seemed like a fitting way to close one chapter and begin the next.

And so the following morning we got the boat to the border and over the line into Cambodia.