At the River.....

.....by  Groove Armada. This song came on the i-pod on random play as we cruised (aka chugged) down the Mekong River from Saigon. At last something to associate the song with that isn't a Telecom ad! 

We joined a little tour for a few days in the Mekong area. One of those things where you are packed into  various boats and buses and race around doing activities  punctuated by longish periods of mildly uncomfortable travel and questionable hotel accomodation. "Here you will enjoy the tropical fruits, then you will go to see the coconut candy being made and enjoy the coconut candy". Who would have guessed that the Mackintoshes toffee "coconut cream" was all along made to an old Vietnamese recipe?

All in all the experience was pretty good. The deltas areas around Ben Tre and My Tho, the towns of Vinh Long, Can Tho and Chau Doc, snakes, bees, honey, rice wine, dried ginger, fruits, local musicians, coconut candy,  fish,  eating frogs legs in a French colonial building, rice paper being made, rice flour mill, markets (floating and dry), pagodas, temples, fish farms, mosquitoes, humidity, sun, clouds , rain, local Beer, French wine, Vietnamese wine ( for the hell of it), floating hotel. Guides Den, then Tiger imparted their knowledge "or something like that" and we listened as best we could. We enjoyed the company of Boris and Josephine from France amongst others and left Vietnam the richer for having been there.