Angkor Wat, Note the tree growing  from the top of the building.

Catch Up - 13 Nov.

Yes, we are still alive and except for bad colds, well.  We are now back home.

    The flight to Cambodia on Monday, 31 Oct. went well. Not everyone took this side excursion but it
was interesting that of the 15 that did, 4 of us were caucasians, the other 11 Negro.  As I said before, I was the only man on the tour.  We had a great, friendly group and we stayed at the lovely hotel,

Statues at Angkor Wat

Prince D’Angkor in Siem Rep.  The ruins at Angkor Wat  are just that, ruins.  It is a temple complex in Cambodia dating from the 12th century and is the largest religious monument in the world, (402 acres). It was begun as a Hindu temple and later transformed to a Buddhist temple.  I found it interesting but each of the buildings has a sameness and I’m not inclined to appreciate the differences. Of interest was the
way they ground one of the stones against another during construction to make them fit so closely you can’t side a piece of paper between them. It was while in Bangkok that I started to come down with a cold that had gotten worse so I (Dick) skipped a morning session.  The crowds were tremendous.

  On Thurs., Nov. 3 while the rest of the group returned to Bangkok then home in the afternoon, we flew to Ho Chi Min city in Vietnam.  Bruce was waiting for us in the arrivals area and we took a taxi

Motor Bike traffic in Ho Chi Min City

into the city to our hotel, the Duc Vuong.  We have travelled to several countries and I have never seen such a slow, confusing entry system. Almost everyone who had not been there before got in the wrong line and had to be redirected to the place where we paid our $25 each then waited.  It took us close to an hour.  Traffic in Ho Chi Min is amazing.  I am surprised there are not more accidents.  There are motorbikes everywhere, more so than in China.  Our hotel appears very small from the street but the restaurant next door where we had breakfast is part of it.  There is a lovely rooftop restaurant/bar on the 7th floor which we would have liked to use more but it rained each night.
    Friday we visited the ‘War Remnants Museum’ (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_Remnants_Museum) .  Outside exhibits consist of military equipment left behind by the Americans when they left in April, 1975.  There are tanks, aircraft, helicopters, and field artillery. Inside exhibits are mainly photographs with explanation, which were the exhibits are "blatantly one-sided".  We also visited the Ho Chi Min museum which again were mainly photographs telling the story of President Ho “Uncle Ho” to the Vietnmese).
   Saturday we went to see the ‘Water Puppet’ show.  It was interesting, performed with the puppets all in a large pool.  Unfortunately it was all in Vietnamese so we had difficulty following the story.  Afterward we walked by the central market.  They were setting up the night market but we didn’t stay.  It was then on to walking street where the road way is closed to traffic at night and hundreds were enjoying a stroll.

The interior of a 42 passenger 'sleeper bus'

   On Sunday, 6 Nov., we took a ‘sleeper bus’ north for the 4 ½ hour trip to Mui Ne on the coast.  Instead of regular seats, these busses have 2 levels of reclining seats in 3 rows so you can lie down semi reclined.  Except at the very back in the 4 seats at the end of the aisles, they are a little too short for anyone my height.  Going to Mui Ne I found it kind of cramped.  (You take off your shoes when you enter the bus and they give you a plastic bag to hold them.  Coming back both Bruce and I got one of the 2 longer ‘bunks’ on the upper level.

The flooded entrance to the guest house

  Mui Ne had been experiencing unusually heavy rains before we arrived and part of the entrance to the Hoang Nga Guesthouse was flooded, 6 inches at one spot.  They were working to pump it out when both we and the sun arrived. It is a family run basic accommodation place, but quite attractive but a long way from 5 star.  One day we rented a restored American Army jeep and driver and went to visit some of the tourist areas including the ‘fishing village’, white sand dunes.  While parked at the fishing village 2 police checked the rented jeeps papers and found them not complete.  A 200,000 dong payment, (about $12) settled that.  At the white dunes, Bruce

US army jeep left behind for tourists.

rented a quad runner and went exploring the dunes.  Eva and I considered it too hot out there in the sun for us so we stayed behind.  We then went to the red sand dunes which were less impressive.  Bruce rented a motor bike for 2 days to do some exploring and Eva and I took it easy as we were both under the weather with a cold.
   Monday evening we went to a seafood restaurant for a lovely meal.  Bruce ferried us the 6 km to the restaurant and back on the motor bike, (one at a time). 
   Back in Ho Chi Min city  we spent our last night back at the Duc Vuong Hotel .  The weather was clear so we got to spend some time on the 7th floor terrace.  Wednesday at 8:30 we shared a  taxi to the airport with another couple for our 11:30 am flight to Hong Kong then to Toronto.  Arriving at Pearson Airport we picked up our car at the Park-N-Fly then drove to the nearby Comfort Inn for the night before returning to Belleville Thursday morning, (10 Nov.).