Mekong Delta ……..early morning visit to the Can Tho Floating Market

December 3rd

We are up with the cockerels, time for a quick coffee/tea and meet our guide for the day. We head to the Green Village dock, where our sampan awaits. By 06:00. we push off and after about an hour of going through various canals, we reach the  Song Hau River one of the many tributaries of the Mekong River. This is where the Cai Rang Floating Market is located > the biggest floating market in the Mekong Delta. The market was initially formed to meet the trading needs of the locals while the road traffic system was still in its infancy. Now, 100 years later, it’s still in operation!

Packed into a section of the river, large vessels sell all sorts of fruits and vegetables grown locally as well in locales some number of miles distant: durian, milk fruit, rambutan, melon, pineapple, mangoes, grapefruit, sweet potatoes and a host of vegetables etc., as well there are processed specialties, such as fish sauce, coconut candy, or dried fish…

At this point, we are getting a bit hungry but no worries there are smaller sampans which weave in and out selling anything from banh mi to bun rieu, to coffee, coconut water and lottery tickets. Soon enough we are rafted up with a couple of boats and breakfast to go is on its way….pho soup and coffee, very tasty…

Our boatman (part of the family owning the lodge) and the owners of the “resto” boats are quite jovial, the pho lady was particularly smiley as she went about her tasks….

On the water, amidst churning river boats there was also a lot of chitter-chatter and joking among the various crews…

 

We also stopped at a pineapple boat….btw all sellers display long bamboo poles to which they tie the fruits/vegetables they are selling…and enjoyed some fruit as well as buying some candied coconut ribbons….yum!!!!

After this we are taken to a rice noodle “factory”, 4 family members work all day to make 1 million Dong net ( 57 CAD) ….a 40-year-old business which is about as low tech as you can get: Mix tapioca and rice flour, spread a thin layer over hot “kettles”, lift & place on bamboo mats with a rattan roller, sun dry, run through a shredder, make 5-kilo bundles and deliver by scooter to the buyer… all the product is sold in the Can Tho area…another example of how much manual labour is seen throughout Vietnam…I think we were more hindrance than help…

No stopping the intrepid, as we head off to the local land market with our guide stopping to explain some of the products on sale as well as the locals’ customs/practices. This is a pleasant market and it is interesting that this “poor” country has such an astonishing array of produce and seafood compared to our sophisticated supermarkets ….btw the bluish/black chickens are real and prized > Silkie chickens…

Before heading back we gassed up while our guide serenaded us on his ukulele…a very pleasant and ambitious young man…just passed his exams to vie for a scholarship to study plant biosomething in the Netherlands, he learned his English (excellent) from BBC Youtube Instructables, I asked him if he would return to Vietnam and he said he was determined to return and work with the young generation to move the country in a positive direction…..we can only wish him the best of luck!!

On the way back we can see river dwellings and businesses which are all part of the river’s life…

….and then enter the canals leading back to whence we started at daybreak….

 

We are back at the lodge by around 10:30 having completed what seems like a full day of activities. So a bit of a siesta, lunch onsite and then another walkabout of the surrounding area….before some more down time…

Before dinner we ask Camille to reserve the morning bus for tomorrow and taxi to get to the bus station. She is a tiny, vivacious young woman, with a ready smile and pretty good self learned English. After a while she comes back and tells us that the only bus available leaves at 18:00 so we would be arriving in Chau Doc around 21:30, not ideal at all as we hate arriving in a new city at night…we ask if there are any other options she says no, unfortunately not…given no choice, we reluctantly agree …she then gives us a note written in Vietnamese confirming the departure time etc, saying she guessed we would decide to go ahead….then impishly reads back the note stating a departure time of 10:00, we look confused and she breaks out in a fit of giggles for having so convincingly fooled us….we all had a good laugh at our expense….never in our travels have we seen someone exhibit this level of pranking….

We really enjoyed the day!!! Dinner is simple but tasty and all you can eat: soup, fried chicken, rice, julienned chayotte (type of squash), some beers and pleasant conversation with several other visitors…as usual the conversation turns to the USA and it’s dictator wannabe…..we have yet to meet anyone who can fathom why he has as much support as he does…but then the conversation veers off in other directions, as the world goes on, an indication of the total loss of respect/relevance the U.S. has achieved in such a short space of time.

As a reference point accommodations for two nights including 1 taxi pick-up, 2 breakfasts & dinners were CAD 153 for us both with the floating market  tour an additional 43 CAD.

Tomorrow more adventures await us as we will be moving on through the delta.