Ho Chi Minh City: 27th - 30th July 2015

On Monday the 27th of July we arrived in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. I had never seen a country that was so effected by poverty before, the view from the plane was a bit of a shock but as we got further into the city the western influence appeared. 

A bit of advice when it comes to obtaining a visa in Vietnam, have EVERYTHING prepared, double check everything on the form and have the money there and then! We didn't have the money as we didn't get US dollars before our travels and we regret not doing so, they do not want to help you and some are so rude. They pretend like you do not exist and that's very hard to deal with if there is a language barrier but eventually we got through thanks to other westerners rather than the Vietnam airport staff themselves.  We stayed in a recommended place called Long Hostel, some of the locals helped us find it as we were the clear image of lost travellers. We got to the city about mid day due to a very early flight and we were exhausted so the first day was a write off as we got something to eat and caught up on our sleep. 

Day 2: We woke up earlier than we had on most days on our travels so far, our plan was to walk around to get a feel of the city and to see a few museums. Ho Chi Minh City is well known for its war history and so most of the museums were focused on the American war and the history of Vietnam being a communist country. Across from the museum was the post office and the cathedral, although we didn't get to experience the cathedral it was a magnificent building and we found out some of the history towards it due to tagging along with an American tour group.

Walking around a city in high temperatures usually gets difficult after a while for the typical Brit so we stopped for coffee in a small chain called highland coffee, I have to say the Vietnamese coffee tastes much better than coffee from the UK which surprised me as I didn't think Asia would be big on coffee due to primarily being tea drinkers but it was a lovely surprise as it was delicious. At this point in the trip we were starting to settle down and get into the routine of being away from home, although we still missed home slightly the excitement of exploring new places and experiencing new things outweighed the homesickness. 

We decided to see an acrobatic show that was recommended to us by trip advisor, it was performed in the opera house in the middle of the city and it reminded me of the O2 Brixton academy at home.

The performance was something that we had never experienced, people pretending to be ducks, turtles and frogs whilst jumping and cartwheeling around, it didn't seem to have a plot but it proved to be popular. For dinner we found a familiar dim sum place, it was a nice break from the rain and proved popular to the locals!

Day 3: We woke up early to attend a tour of the Chu chi tunnels, the bus ride was about an hour but we were able to get to know more people from our hostel. On the way we stopped at a market where they created paintings and pottery out of eggshells, it was an unusual process but the detail that was produced in the artwork was remarkable and it proves how much work goes into producing some artwork. The tour itself was interesting, our tour guide was a cheery Vietnamese man who clearly thought he was one with the ladies and made many puns that most of us didn't understand, none the less the experience of the tunnels and the history of the war between Vietnam and America was educational and proved that war doesn't seem to solve much. Before we went home we stopped to see the war museum, not being a fan of war history myself I didn't find it quite so interesting but daniel was enthusiastic about the war tanks and planes so everyone was happy. 

Overall Ho Chi Minh City was a crazy, cultural city that threw us into the deep end of the Vietnamese culture but it's prepared us for what else is to come! 

Love Tam xox

P.s don't shoot guns, stay safe kids xox 

Hong Kong Day 6

Hello all, 

The last time I updated you on our travels we had only been in HK for a day and now it's our last night before we leave for Vietnam. Over the last few days we've squeezed a fair bit in but we also discovered there isn't much to do here, however this didn't stop us from doing our own little personal tour around HK. 

First we stopped off at Victoria peak, unfortunately due to the weather you couldn't see the skyline that we'd hoped but it was still proving popular for tourists as we had to wait a fair bit to get up there. We didn't expect there to be much there but there seemed to be a whole new town, markets and all! This meant we could amuse ourselves for a good few hours but by the time we wanted to leave the tram lines had grown so we decided to work our own way down, by walking. This proved a good idea at the time because as it grew darker the surroundings mimicked a jungle and we saw parts of Hong Kong we wouldn't have seen, however due to being close to water I got bitten quite a bit and it was further than we thought to get home but nevertheless it proved a worth while trip! 

On Friday we left the main island to travel to Disneyland, my inner child was leaping with joy as the last time I went to anything Disney was when I was around 6 years old! As soon as we arrived I equipped myself with a pair of Minnie Mouse ears and away we went, there wasn't as much as the US one but the different lands were still fun (even for a 22 year old) I clearly dragged Dan on a couple of rides he wasn't happy with but he got his fare share of fun when we watched the Lion king show. However, we were slightly disappointed that they didn't tell the story quite like the Disney one but it brought back great memories of my US trip. Both of us agreed it wasn't totally worth the £50 entry but we were still glad we got to experience Disney as adults! 

MANA FAST SLOW FOOD: vegetarian restaurant on Wellington street, Central Hong Kong. 

This place was AMAZING, I was so happy to eat familiar vegetables and to experience more vegetarian cuisine. It's best to order the half wrap to start as even though Dan and I were starving we clearly ordered too much and we ended up leaving nearly half of it to waste, this company is very Eco friendly and the staff are always helpful for recommendations, definitely worth a visit if you're in HK. 

On Saturday we didn't end up doing much as we didn't get up until 1, we found a great a coffee shop that made a milky tea latte, which was an English breakfast flavoured latte we found it pretty strange but Daniel has since become accustomed to it. Saturday was definitely a food day as not that much later we travelled to Central to try a famous cheap Michelin style restaurant named Tim Ho Wan, I expected it to be bigger due to the popularity but all we saw was a small cafe style restaurant packed full of people that overflowed outside. Thankfully as we were a two, we only had to wait half an hour and funnily enough we were put best to the only other westerners in the restaurant. From Google we were recommended to try the pork buns, I had to let my vegetarianism slip as they were one of the best things I had ever tasted but since then and before hand I hadn't eaten any meat! 

We planned to go to the temple street night market situated on the other island, we took the ferry to catch the light show as we rode across. It was a great market, bustling with people and no one seemed to harass you which was refreshing so we had a good nose of all the different clothes, electronics and souvenirs you could purchase. 

    

We've had a lovely time in HK, bring on Vietnam! ☺️

Love Tam xox

Hong Kong Day 1

Today was our first day in Hong Kong, after we both decided to finally get up at 1pm HK time we were greeted with torrential rain and thunder. Not being dragged down by this unexpected weather we decided to look for somewhere to eat as both of us hadn't eaten since the flight the night before. 

On our way around the central part of HK, we came across a few parks and the harbour, it wasn't very busy due to the poor weather but the parks created the atmosphere of a rainforest and it was quite beautiful. The harbour was pretty but it mimicked many other harbours around the world so we didn't spend much time getting to know it. 

For dinner, we decided to treat ourselves to some dim sum, it was something both of us hadn't really done before and typically we ordered too much but and for someone who is trying to become vegetarian it didn't give us many options. However, we ordered food we have never tried and all in all it was a success, the restaurant was called Din Tai Fung and we strongly recommend it to anyone staying in HK. 

After dinner we explored around the centre a bit more to get our bearings of the place, this ice cream parlour caught our eyes as we were walking home. We were curious on how nitrogen was involved in making the ice cream so we ordered some and watched, it was a very strange process and looked rather like a science experiment but the results were delicious! We had the Hokkaido milk flavour and we discovered that the parlour changes the flavours every two weeks to make it stand out from the crowd and we only saw a very short menu of four flavours when we first entered. 

Do you have any recommendations or good experiences of HK?

Love Tam xox