1 1/2 hours - 14 hours - 5 1/2 hours

Sunday, Nov. 25th, 6:30 am

1 1/2 hours - 14 hours - 5 1/2 hours

That's the flight time to get from Minneapolis to Ho Chi Minh City and that doesn't include airport time (hint - it was a lot of hours). Then there's the traffic, it's crazy, even on a Saturday, and it took us almost an hour to get to our hotel by hired driver, without the traffic it would probably have been a 10 minute drive, the airport is right in the city in District 10. The masses of cars, trucks, and motorbikes are staggering and the motorbikes weave in and out of traffic as if every driver believes they are invincible. They will also drive on the sidewalk and being a pedestrian here in HCMC is an adventure all on its own. We quickly learned to cross the street by closely following Vietnamese people, they know what they're doing and you can cross safely if you just stick to crossing right behind them. Even if the light is in your favor that means nothing. Motorbikes are whizzing around from all directions and many run the lights.

How's the weather? It's hot and humid. We're going to be pretty sticky for our whole stay here, however, I promised Don I wouldn't complain about the humidity if we came here so that's the last word on that.

We only had the energy yesterday to unpack, have a drink in the hotel bar and venture out twice. The first time was just a block away to the pharmacy to buy band aids. You buy them in singles, not by the box, at least that's how it's done in this tiny little pharmacy (about the size of a large walk-in closet). We bought five large band aids for 10,000 dong, about 45 cents in USD. 

In the hotel lobby bar with my vodka tonic with a large pink straw. Don's gin and tonic had a blue straw.

Our next time out of the hotel was to stroll around the large Tao Dan Park, which is 10 hectares of Saigon and is home to over 1,000 big trees. We only took a few pictures since it was getting dark.

The reflecting pool is empty because work is being done on it. Too bad, I bet it would make for a lovely scene.

We only looked at one small section of the park, we'll explore more tomorrow.

Since we were weak from hunger (my declaration, not Don's) it was time to find a place to eat. Don noticed a sign for a restaurant down an alley just a few steps from our hotel. We were the only customers at 5 pm. A note on service: food comes to the table when it is ready and in no relation to how it was ordered. Don't expect to get an appetizer before the entree. We ordered a spring roll appetizer and a seafood pomelo salad for me and beef bun bo for Don. It was all amazingly fresh and tasty. The seafood pomelo salad came out first and Don and I decided to just share the food as it came to the table. The salad was wonderfully presented:

A rather large shrimp trying to escape from the bowl. 

The fruit and mint were so fresh and the light dressing was a little spicy. I would order this again. The three spring rolls were a revelation and the beef bun bo with noodles was tasty and all the ingredients were fresh. We shared a bottle of water and the total bill was under $10 USD. 

After that we just couldn't stay awake, and we tried. We should have had a coke or coffee with dinner, we hadn't had enough coffee on this trip and it would probably have helped keep us awake until at least 9 pm.