We woke in the hotel in Ho Chi Minh City, ate breakfast, and took a taxi to the bus station..well...it wasn't the bus station, but is is where a van will take us to the bus station. As expected, the van took us to the station and we got off to find us being the only Europeans there. There were buses coming and going and a guy on a microphone outside announcing where each bus was going...of course this was all in Vietnamese. Every time a bus pulled up I showed someone our ticket and they just shook their head "no". Finally some official looking guy asked to see our ticket and just held out his hand in a wait position and walked away. I was pretty confident that this guy was now going to take care of us, but Tim was a bit worries. I can't believe that after all this traveling he is still a nervous traveler. He is fine when we get on the transportation, but he worries about us getting on the right transpiration and then worries about getting off at the right location. Me on the other hand is like don't worry...it will all work out. I guess this is why we are good travel companions. Anyway...after about 20 minutes that official looking guy pointed at a bus that we should get on, so we did.
At this point we are traveling blind. All I know is to tell the bus driver that we need to get off at the Bình Minh bus station and we are supposed to meet a girl named Susan...even I was a bit nervous about this all working out, especially since I didn't have to leave any deposit for this tour and we don't have a phone to contact Susan if she was not there. Three hours after boarding the bus the ticket guy pointed at us to get off and there was Susan ready to greet us...AWESOME! After saying hello and introducing ourselves so talked to a van driver and told us to get in. She said that the van will drop us off where we need to go and she would be behind us on her motorbike. Uhm...OK. The van pulled out and went down the road as I saw in the window Susan still walking to her bike. Again that, what if the driver stops at the wrong place or forgets about us, feeling came over us. After only 10 minutes the van stops in front of a gas stationnand the driver points to us to get out. As soon as we got out a gentleman approached and asked if we were Tim and Gerri. He was the owner of the home-stay and will walk us back there...AWESOME!
We walked back to our home-stay, was given our room, and was told that lunch would be served in 1 hour. We had some time to relax, so we found the hammocks and relax we did:
The next morning, before leaving I took these pictures of the home-stay:
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After the snack we went back to the boat and headed back to Can Tho. What an amazing couple of days we had with Susan.
We figured we better go to the pier and try to get information for tomorrow's trip. We get to the pier and of course no one speaks English so I show them the tour book and point to Ca Mau where we want to go tomorrow. He nodded and pointed at the board that said there was a boat leaving at 1:30 PM going to Sông Dốc. I said no Sông Dốc...Ca Mau, and he just nodded. Through pointing and nodding we understood that the boat going to Sông Dốc will stop at Ca Mau. Great!
Now time for lunch and beer:
After the crash, we went back to the hotel to relax a bit. In case we missed our kite all we had to do was look out the window of our hotel room. That bright orange kite sure stands out!
Anyway, I was invited to get up and talk about the role of women in the US. They were very surprised that I spent 20 years int he military and that I was an officer and a leader...in Vietnam women are not allowed to join the military. I pretty much gave the "If you want something bad enough and you are willing to work hard enough, you will be able to achieve it" speech. We wound up spending over 2 hours there and really enjoyed the experience: