Adventures, anecdotes and advice from three months exploring Ho Chi Minh City
The most stunning residence in Sadec is the former house of Huynh Thuy Le, made famous by Maugerite Duras' semi-autobiographical novel, The Lover. Today, the house is open for tours, and also operates as a guesthouse. It's impossible to imagine a more atmospheric place to stay while in Sadec, and we were unable to resist.
Our first month in Saigon was just like our first motor-taxi ride: fast, fun, scary, exhilarating, and over before we knew what was happening. This city is a blast. We've had an amazing time getting comfortable with its pace, and getting to know its history, culture, people and food.
After a couple days exploring Vinh Long and An Binh, we took a bus further inland until reaching Sadec, a small city in the Mekong Delta with a wonderfully tranquil pace.
On the outskirts of Vinh Long, a set of factories produces bricks, vases, statues and a million other ceramics. With towering brick kilns poking out of the palm trees like the stupas of Angkor Wat and an absolutely relaxed policy toward visitors, visiting them make for a unique and rewarding excursion.
Part of our boat tour around An Binh Island was a stop at a small candy factory, where we learned how to prepare a few of Vietnam's favorite traditional sweets.
It's unavoidable. If you plan on spending any time on the Mekong Delta, you're going to be taking a boat trip. Who visits the Mekong and doesn't take a boat trip? And it's just as unavoidable that, unless you're willing to invest a lot of money, your trip will be pretty touristy. But that doesn't mean it can't also be fun.
For our initial excursion to the Mekong Delta, we choose to stay on An Binh, an island between the towns of Vinh Long and Cai Be. We spent the first day of our trip biking around the island, and photographing its postcard-worthy images of life on the delta.
Water puppetry is an art form which has been entertaining Vietnamese audiences since the 11th century. The shows were originally performed in the country's rice fields, but today are usually found in theaters. We went to Saigon's most well-known venue, the Golden Dragon Theater, to check out one of the shows.
In our neighborhood, there aren't many supermarkets. Even that's an overstatement; there actually isn't a single supermarket anywhere near us. So we've had to become familiar the local market, or "chợ". And the market's vendors have had to become familiar with us. Trust is a two-way street, people... and Saigon's markets are worlds unto themselves.
As we knew it would, eating has become a major highlight of our time in Saigon. We've been sticking almost entirely to street food, and have loved just about every dish we've had. Here's another selection of some of our favorites.
