Views over Ho Chi Minh

As a result of a late night we had a lazy morning, but had to check out of our hotel as they didn’t have space for us to stay a few more nights. After moving hotels, Dan unfortunately then received an email about a connecting flight from Cambodia to Bali on the 30th August being cancelled. This took more time than expected to rearrange flights as the options were limited meaning we could only really fly a few days earlier on the 27th, shortening our time in Cambodia. As a result we've planned to leave Ho Chi Minh one day earlier, although still need to finalise transport for this.

Once this was all sorted, we visited a Traditional Vietnamese Medicine Museum. This was a highly rated museum and although full of artefacts, was more of a showcase with little explanation. Nonetheless, good to see and understand how important various herbs and plants had been for historic medicine up until relatively recently. It was also interesting to understand how Vietnam and China were effectively competing against one another in the medical field and therefore built on each other’s success to become one of the global leading countries in medicine, although this could be self proclaimed. Lastly and where historic medicine perhaps looses some of its credibility considering modern day treatment is the significance of two fundamental factors in Asian medicine. Firstly, ‘Yin and Yang’ describing the importance between opposite human states such as hot-cold, deficiency-excess etc. Secondly, describing the importance of the five elements within the body. Major organs are grouped into the elements of water, wood, fire, earth, and metal. These five elements have close connections, which means if a person has one weak element, it would lead to an excess of another one and must be treated accordingly. Not sure we're sold, then again this isn’t our area.

After the museum, we left for the Bitexco Skydeck to watch the sunset. Ho Chi Minh has a few observation points, the Bitexco tower at 264m high and more impressively the Landmark 81 at 461m high (Vietnams tallest building). We opted for the Bitexco tower as this looked out over central Ho Chi Minh (District 1) where we stayed. As expected, the views were stunning, and the sunset just kept getting better and better as the evening went on. It was amazing to watch the transition from light to dark and see the city light up. Ho Chi Minh is a truly beautiful place, especially at night.

After, we wandered about the streets trying a new Vietnamese dish, Bun Rieu which was nice! A local man tried to teach us how to use chopsticks properly, but after a few minutes of trying we had to accept we just didn't have the knack! We then stumbled across a trendy market selling clothes. These stalls seemed a little more upmarket than other markets we'd seen, but the prices were still super cheap. Whilst being quickly measured to get the right size for a top, Jess was informed she was a size large… to which Dan burst out laughing. That is Vietnamese sizing for you!

We then rode back to the hotel where again the night didn’t go as planned. Upon checking into the new hotel, we hadn’t been overly impressed with the room; rather dusty and we found a few ants on the wall but we thought we’d make do. However, whilst looking at the dust we found a gecko behind the desk. And that was it, Jess was not impressed at all! Calling reception to come and remove the gecko, we also voiced our concerns about the room. The man who arrived to remove the gecko was unsuccessful but told us it would be fine and not to worry?! You can imagine Jess' response to that! Not happy with the prospect of sleeping with a gecko somewhere in the room so we just wanted to leave. We understand that some people would have just gotten on with it or changed rooms but this wasn't going to happen. After a lot of discussion, being shown another room to encourage us to stay, we were finally given a full refund and found a nicer hotel just down the street. Not ideal, but its a story! It's a shame so much of the day was taken to deal with problems and changes out of our control, but we guess that’s what comes with travelling!Läs mer