At the Mekong Delta

All in all, it was a good trip.  It's a bit of a tourist trap (as in, get you out to an island and then give you the opportunity to buy lots of stuff) but was a really good time and interesting to see, in person, such an important place in both Vietnamese and American history.

 

A line of tourist boats.

 

I highly recommend some type of baby slingy-thingy.  It makes life sooooo much easier when one's tramping through a jungle or some other such terrain.

 

Our baby.

 

Here's a view of the ledge that we had to climb over to get onto the boat.  Dani was a bit nervous, but she made it.  Actually, not one of us from either family fell in the water at any point.  Success!

 

Leia and Deacon.

 

This is our tour guide, Kim, showing us how they spike open the coconuts at the candy workshop.  At first, she would begin each sentence with "Ladies and gentlemen" then I think she realized that wasn't really necessary.  She was very friendly.  Towards the end of the tour, she said that we must be the richest people there because we have our own private airport (referring to the bald strip on the top of my head that one could land a plane on).  She thought that was real funny until I gave her 500 dong for a tip--16,000 dong equal one US Dollar.  (Just kidding, of course.)

 

Here's the machine that extracts the coconut milk from the pulp.

 

Stirs and heats the milk, or something or other.  I don't remember.  I just wanted some candy.

 

A big pool of yummy coconut goodness.

 

This was when I realized that we were just there to buy stuff.  Which, of course, we did.  We didn't want to be rude, after all.

 

Back on the boat.  Again, no falling into the water!

 

The boat driver steered the boat with his feet.  Much more impressive than when I steer the car with my left knee.

 

 

As of now, there is no bridge over the Mekong River (at least at this point, or anywhere along it) so people have to take ferries.  This bridge will be done within a few years.

 

The barges carry mostly rice up the river.

 

Welcome to Unicorn Island.

This gibbon would reach through the bottom of his cage and grab anything he could get his hands on.  He managed to grab Dani's knee as she walked by.

 

Huuuuuge python.

 

The other gibbon.  This one was much more well-behaved.

 

   

One of a couple samplings along the way.  This one was different local fruits.  Most were yummy.  One thing I'll be doing back at home is dipping pineapple in a mixture of salt and crushed red chili peppers. 

 

Here's a before and after of the little weird eyeball fruit.  When the exterior is peeled, it reveals a squishy little gel-covered seed.  Yeah.

 

My two girls.

 

This fruit "smells like hell and tastes like heaven" according to Kim.  We didn't taste it but the smell part is true.

 

This baboon would get jealous if you showed any kind of affection to each other.  If we held hands he would raise his eyebrows up (which is a reaction to stress or a threat).

 

 

A monkey bridge.  I totally wanted to cross it but I figured it would be a bad idea with Norah strapped to me when I fell into the water and contracted some random parasite.

 

Another big snake, this one slowly constricting Dani to her death.

 

Ok.  I'm not sure how to delicately describe what happened just minutes before this picture was taken.  Behind me are the restrooms and I'm coming out, fairly happy and pleased with myself that Norah and I are still dry.  And I never took the sling off once.    Uh, yeah.  Next picture.

 

Hand-made linens.

 

Those are little snakes stuffed into these bottles.  Yum?

 

After Dani took this picture our guide asked her, "What did you just take a picture of?"  Dani said, "The cups.  They're pretty."  The guide was so confused. 

 

More yummy coconut goodies.

 

More feeding of the Norah.  She's definitely gotten her appetite back.

 

We took little four-person rowboats back to the main tourist boats.  This part was definitely my favorite of the tour for two reasons, I got to wear the rockin' ).

 

The women who were driving these rowboats were amazingly strong.

 

 

Boats passing.  They warned us to keep our fingers inside the boats since they'd pretty much smack into each other as they passed.

 

My head in a cone amongst the trees.

 

 

One of few ferries going back and forth.

 

Apparently these houses on stilts are slowly being dismantled and will all be gone within a few years.