Along the Mekong Delta

Joel had intended to post the next blog but unfortunately has come down with a case of what we’ve named Cambodian Cocô – that's Portugese for poo ;-) So while he rests I thought I’d fill you in on our past week…

Backtracking a couple days back into Vietnam; we visited the floating markets of Cai Rang, which were nice to see and had some delicious food however we felt a bit cheated by the tour. The lady who approached us had spoken perfect English and told us about all the things ‘she’ would show us and take us to if we went with her tour. After we paid she mentioned either her uncle or sister would pick us up at 530 the next morning and take us out.. we didn’t think too much of it.

The lady who picked us up (I assume it was the sister) spoke all of two words – hello and madam, which made the next couple hours pretty bleak when wanting to ask questions or trying to buy from the market stalls. We just sat in the boat and allowed her to chauffer us along the river in silence haha. Still, I did get to enjoy some delicious watermelon and pineapple so I was happy.

That afternoon we caught the bus from Can Tho to Chau Doc, another small town closer to the border of Cambodia, where we stayed the night before catching the early boat into Cambodia. Once again we boarded a small bus, with 4 people sat to a seat, but that was okay as we knew from last time it was only a transfer to the bus station where we would board the bigger bus. A couple hours in we realised we were wrong! The 4+ hour bus ride was horribly uncomfortable.

Upon arriving in Chau Doc the bus stopped and the driver got out and started pointing at the two of us and saying “you two, off here”. No one else was getting off and there were other tourists also destined for Chau Doc so we were getting very confused as to where we actually were and why we were the only the two being told to get off. Of course no one could speak any English other than “Chau Doc, you off” so panic was starting to set in!
Turns out we had little to worry about. Someone must have told them we were catching the boat the next day from the floating hotel which was exactly where we were, Phew!

We caught the Fast Boat across the border into Phnom Penh, Cambodia. I don’t know whether it lived up to its name ‘fast’ but it was an exciting and different way to cross the border into another country. The boat was supposed to leave at 730am and take about 5 hours including immigration however ending up being a day trip, leaving the doc around 845am and not arriving in PP until 5pm. It wasn’t too bad though, I enjoyed chilling back in the breeze reading my kindle :-)

Dock at the floating Cambodian Immigration Office

I’ll continue with Cambodia in the next blog...

Renée