“You’re going away for how long?” An oft recited rhetorical question when we told people of our next holiday. Four months can seem like a long time to be away from home. Indeed it is a long time to be away from home. However, confronted with a need to re-schedule our next nine or ten weeks or so, as I will explain, it dawned on us that perhaps we were a little short in the time department for what we wanted to do.

Phileas Fogg, famously, circumnavigated the globe in a mere 80 days. If I remember correctly, he only just made it back to his Club in London to win his bet. He too, probably realised, half way in, that perhaps he should have built in a little extra time. In any case, Phileas didn’t plan on doing as much as we did, albeit that he was visiting more than 4 countries. For our part, we considered his task, of getting all the way round in a little under 12 weeks, a doddle.

We just didn’t have enough time to fit everything in.

When we left UK we had a fairly good idea of the route that we would take through SE Asia. A start in Thailand working our way to the North and crossing in to Laos would be followed by a flight from Vientianne to Hanoi. From there we would enjoy the North of Vietnam before making our way south to Saigon. Our roughly circular route would be comleted with a Mekong tri into Cambodia and an anti clockwise tour of that country. Overall our trip would be bookended with time at the beaches of Thailand and Cambodia/Thailand.

For the first 7 weeks we had assiduously followed the intended itinerary. Now there was a fly in the ointment. Rather, there was a cloud on the horizon.

Visiting this part of the world requires consulting the weather gods. We are in the tropics, with their wet seasons and dry seasons. West coast or East coast, North or South, this side of the mountains or that. In general the first quarter of the calendar year offers the best chance of “good” weather. We know instinctively that there will be rainy days. Indeed, we experienced a rainy evening during the first week on Koh Lanta in Thailand. This was completely out of sync with the season but, hey ho!

I was minded to recall Forrest Gump, who declares, “One day it started to rain…and it did not stop” I think, in the film, that it was February, but I may be mistaken. I should have made a mental note.

However, the thought of it being cold and rainy whilst we were traipsing around Sapa or sitting on the pillion of a motorbike through the mountains of the Ha Jiang Loop held nothing for us and Ha Long Bay is surely better in the sunshine than the rain. The 10 day and longer forecasts showed temperatures in the low to mid teens with rain and scattered thunderstorms throughout Northern Vietnam.

I set Pat loose on the re-arrangements!

The revised itinerary would take us South. First to Saigon and then to take on the Mekong and into Cambodia. This intended end piece would now become the middle and the main Vietnam sojourn would be delayed untl mid March and April.

Ho Chi Minh City, or Saigon, is a burgeoning sprawling city.

I remember we visited a couple of years apart in the early 2000’s. The country has clearly develoed economically in the past 20 or so years, but nevertheless the action of crossing a major road in this city remains an Herculean task as the number of motorcycles is gargantuan and has legendary status. The routine to be adopted is something along the lines of…Look straight ahead and walk slowly,but purposefully, in a straight line, at a steady pace. No hesitation.

Like Moses at the Red Sea, you’ll find that there is a parting of the waves and a swarm of mopeds, scooters and motorbikes will continue on their way, just as purposefully. Not one will beep their horn at you and each of you will reach your destination without hinderance.

On our final night we caught up with an old friend from HSBC and his wife, who treated us to a meal at a riverside restaurant. The highlight of the meal was the deep fried Dragon Fish.

We made our way to Ben Tre in the Mekong Delta. A sort of inland resort, beside a river rather than the sea. The hotel was relaxing and of not a bad standard.

We asked at reception where we might eat and a local seafood restaurant, which had also been mentioned online, was suggested. This turned out to be a very “local” restaurant, with only a Vietnamese menu. What it did have, however, were large tanks of live fish and seafood. We were able to use a combination of pointing and Google translate to build a meal consisting of rock lobster, prawns and fish, variously, steamed and fried with garlic and whatever else they chose. It was an enjoyable evening of good food, surrounded by beer swilling locals, whose practice is to throw finished beer cans on the floor.

By the way, as an aside, what is the flame point of diesel? I only ask because throughout this region, where the scooter and motorbike are kings, there are thousands of roadside “shops” that have a rack, usually a rickety rack, out front, filled with an array of lemonade and other such bottles, some glass, some plastic, and all containing diesel. Many of these racks sit in the sun all day with temperatures exceeding 38C in the shade. Haven’t heard of any accidents, so I suppose the flame point is quite high.

From Ben Tre we had planned to take an early morning bus to Can Tro. However, on the preceding afternoon we had found a local boat trip on the river and the opportunity to visit local villages to see the many ways in which bees and coconuts can be used to produce…well…produce. Honey, soap and beeswax, while the matting, the oil, the milk and the flesh of the coconuts are variously turned into baskets, door mats, drinks, chocolate, sweets and many other useful things. After the visit, which we concluded just as the main tour group boats descended on the villages, we took a hastily arranged three and a half hour private taxi to Can Tro.

Can Tro is another of the places that we had visited before. We were astounded at the development and had great difficuty in identifying the location of the hotel we had previously used or the balcony of the pizza restaurant we had sat on during a thunderstorm as the electricity wires around us fizzed and cackled. Tourism has undoubtedly been a boon to the town but they really fo need to restrict the size of the buses allowed access to the riverfront area. And don’t get me started on plastic litter.

The floating market is a great attraction here and we were up at sparrow fart to take an hour trip along the river to “enjoy” floating amongst it. We were to be greatly disappointed. There were more tourist boats than trader vessels. This was not how we had remembered it and we had paid a fortune, to boot, to have a private boat rather than go on a larger one with a group of tourists.

Our final destination in this part of our stay in Vietnam, was the border town of Chau Doc. This is a typical frontier town, busy, noisy and poor. It had not improved in the 20 odd years since we last encountered it and we used it merely as a staging post to get across to Cambodia. However, a climb to a nearby hilltop temple affords a great view over the plains to Cambodia.

On the previous occasion that we crossed this border, the Cambodian Immigration, quite literally, consisted of a desk in a field with a toilet shed, some 25 yards beyond. Sat at the desk was an immigration officer, resplendent in his uniform, flanked by two juniors, equally smartly dressed. It was at the time of SARS and we were the only passengers on a 150 seat ferry. In advance, I had learned that the Visa Fee was $21 each and I had $70 dollars in hand ready to pay for the three of us. On handing over the notes, the Officer looked at me. I looked at him. We both smiled as he placed the $70 in the drawer of his desk. I said through my smile, “I don’t speak Khmer and you don’t speak English, but we both know that I’m not getting any change.”

We were both correct. The power of non verbal language.

Gotta love a bit of corruption.