On the road to the Mekong

There are so many photos, I thought I'd break them up a bit.  Yesterday morning found us heading south for a tour of the Mekong Delta.  It was nice to see a slightly different side of Vietnam.  While most of the land we rode through was still fairly urban, it was more small towns than the major metropolitan madhouse of Saigon.

 

At this point, we had seen just about everything on a motorbike.  Trees, cables, infants, babies, and now dogs.

 

  

There were quite a few Happy Valentines Day banners and such around.  The Vietnamese celebrate the day as we do.

 

 

It's interesting to see the variety of shops within feet of each other.  There will be fine clothing shops like this one, and then a few doors down will be a random mechanic's shop or teddy bear emporium.

 

We crossed over many rivers on the way.  We have no idea if it was all the Saigon or the Mekong. 

 

There were a lot of really nice homes on the way also.  Again, it was interesting to see these types of homes next to ramshackle huts.  Massive juxtaposition all over this country.

 

With my geektitude in art history/architecture, I can't stop paying attention to the fact that almost all of the architecture here is either French influenced/neo-classical or very modern/utilitarian/Communist-influenced.  That's all I'll say about that at the risk of putting everyone to sleep.

 

I can't imagine putting Norah on one of these things.  Not to say it isn't safe, but wow.

 

Taking a little nappy-poo.

 

Look closely at this man.  While most Vietnamese people tend to have on long-sleeves and whatnot this time of year, apparently this gentleman needed to air himself out a bit.

 

I don't think I could walk with this bundle of cables, much less ride on the motorbike.

 

We started seeing a lot of these small little graveyards spotted around the fields. 

 

Every now and then you'll see a woman riding side-saddle.  Again, I can't imagine.  I kept having these darting fears that I was going to hit a bump and shoot right off the back when I was riding on one.  Whoop!  Thump thump thump.  Dead fat American in the road.

 

So many beautiful lush fields here.

 

Ducks!

 

Cow!

 

Baby!