The Ford Ranch: Saigon - Ho Chi Minh City

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January 26^th

Today dawned on the Saigon River as we meandered our way toward Ho Chi Minh City. The ship is too large to make it all the way so we dock at a container port about 2 hours drive from downtown and we get a car and driver into the city. Ho Chi Minh City has changed more than it’s name in the years since I was here. Cleaned up, new building everywhere. But traffic and scooters still rule the roost here. What a change from up north. Chaos reins on the streets with few light, many round abouts and people driving and walking in all directions at once.

First stop the Notre Dame cathedral and the nearby Post Office. Both carefully preserved and care for. Post cards written to the grand kids so they at least can see what we are up to. Eiffel of The Eiffel tower fame built the Post Office so it is a work of art unto itself. Thankfully our guide is watching and carefully moving us from place to place in spite of the traffic. We move quickly here from place to place.

And what pops up before us but a Hard Rock Café. Can’t miss going into one of these so a brief stop to purchase a shirt or four. Don’t know about the red flag and gold star that is on them but we will see how that feels.

We notice here that there are large projects under construction but no one working on them. Seems the way to do things here is start and keep building till you run out of money and stop till more funds arrive. So many projects are in various states of completion. One project recently completed and open is a first limited access highway from the port to downtown. Completely separate lanes two for trucks and cars separated from two more lanes just for scooters. Eight lanes in all and very nice. One issue however is that you must be willing to go from beginning to end as off ramps aren’t built yet. Works for us and by passes a famous military base from days gone by. Long Bin. Only vets will know Long Bin because it was the jail for military folks serving in Vietnam.

It was time for lunch and we had to answer the question Western or Vietnamese food. The correct answer for us was Vietnamese and particularly Pho. Just so happened to be near a place visited by Bill Clinton for this famous soup so we jumped at the chance. Three bowls of soup, crispy spring rolls, and drinks, a big $16 US dollars. Nice. Pho 2000

People here take US Dollars cheerfully. You can buy Dong but at 20,000 Dong for one dollar you quickly get lost in the massive number of zeros. I cashed in $60 US and immediately became a millionaire. But even the businesses here mark US prices and make US change. Anything to get you to spend money.

The afternoon was a bit stressful. I think it is mandatory that guides take you to over to two “attractions”. First the War Museum and then the Presidential Palace. We were offered an hour to tour the War Museum but after 5 minutes it was time to leave. Winners get to write the history and that they have done. Mostly the same propaganda that the North was putting out for years highlighting everything we did wrong and not even mentioning anything good. Also if you want to see equipment we left behind just go visit this place. The Palace was not much better. At least it had a nice garden around the place. I did have to get the lecture about what the Ho Chi Minh trail was and how it was used. Also we listened to the “hero” stories of how they changed sides in the last days of the war.

We left as quickly as we could. I honestly believe that no guide could keep their job without putting their visitors through this. Indoctrination is a part of life here but it got us moving back to the vessel for a quiet evening.

Thankfully we made the trip back safely and just hung out at a ship’s barbeque by the pool. Nice change from the last day in Vietnam.

In all it was a good visit. Ha Long is grand and certainly well worth the trip. Da Nang was busy and a business town but for us a stepping-stone to Hue which we loved. Nha Trang was our highlight and a wonderful stop, which we would visit again. Ho Chi Minh City is pretty but not a highlight for us. Now on to Cambodia.

ps....this was much hard place to visit