Mekong River Budget Tour

It started out okay...pickup at our hotel, made friends with Amelie and Christ (from Germany), nice guide. And more or less it was okay. Truthfully we weren't sure what we signed up for. Barbara did not want to see the Cuchi caves (claustrophobia) and the other trips seemed too long. So we bought a rather inexpensive tour -- I think it was $10. For this we got an enormous amount of activities. First we drove out to the delta, boarded a boat that took us to an island. On the island, we were boarded onto canoes where ladies paddled through a two-mile canal. Off those boats, we went to a honey bee center where we were served tea and saw a beehive demonstration. These bees subsisted on Longan fruit although we couldn't really tell by the taste. 

We also saw a coconut candy factory where they demonstrated how the candy was made from peeling and cracking the coconut on to boiling and making the candy.

There was musical entertainment including jingle bells and "if you're happy and you know it clap your hands." We were served tea and an assortment of tropical fruits including Longan and durian. The durian was actually good.

Finally we boarded to boat again and went to lunch. We had thought it was impossible to get a bad meal in Vietnam, but it turns out this is not true. The meal, shockingly, was the low point of the day with uninspired pork cutlet, rice, and green beans. We also order the special Mekong river fish -- a whole (unsealed!) deep fried fish that we picked at and rolled into spring rolls. But yuck! No herbs, just lettuce, flavor just okay, no delicious dipping sauce. Hard to understand given that excellent food exists everywhere else.

We had an excruciating trip back on an overcrowded bus where Barbara vowed she would not book with anyone except the tour company we used for Halong Bay last year. I pointed out that we only paid $10 for this tour and $300 for Halong Bay. You get what you pay for. We agree that we would not be booking a budget tour again