One of the many highlights of the Mekong is the floating markets, a snapshot of traditional everyday life on the delta. We had a feeling 40 people on a large boat was not going to provide any real insight into the market, sailing quickly around the outside rather than actually being in amongst it. So we hired a small long tail boat, sharing it with a British brother and sister combo who had similar ideas to us. It also meant we could leave at 5am and see the sun rise over the market, rather than wait for the others who were leaving at 6.45am (optimistically on time) and get there after the market had peaked.
Jumping in a small boat, we headed off in the darkness down the river, with boats all around us heading in the same direction. The sun rise was pretty impressive, peaking over the city of Cam Tho.
Upon arriving at the market, we stopped using our engine, effectively a car engine mounted in the back of the boat with a long axil out the back. Our boat lady rowed us between lots of large boats, all laiden with fruit or vegetables, and a huge pole hanging their goods to out the front of their boats. It was amazing to see hundreds of pineapples amd watermelon being passed (or thrown) into the small boats of the buyers, and we could appreciate life on the bigger cargo ships, as washing, food prep ( and toileting) occurred with a frenzy on the back section of the boats. It was also interesting to observe action in the back of houses that lined the river.
Occasionally a smaller boat would sidle up to us, offering coffee, drinks and a multitude of fried bread products. The coffee was sweet and strong, as well as a little difficult to drink from plastic cups. We tried a cooked banana and rice packet – one mouthful each was enough before it was quickly used to feed the fish!
As the sunrise came, we headed off into a small canal, quietly creeping through small villages and past large fishing booms in the water. It was nice to be the only tourists around, seeing things which weren’t on the typical tour route. At this point the rest of the tour would have only just got to the market, so it was money well spent to know we had seen the best bits for a longer time.
We joined up with the others, and visited a small restaurant that specialised in BBQ frog and sparrow; a delicacy of the Mekong region which was not far removed from eating dry BBQ chicken.
After a quick lunch back in Can Tho, we jumped on a smaller bus as most people were heading back to HCMC city, while we continued west to Cambodia. Packed in with another group we were glad to finish the 2 hour trip to Tra Su. Originally a paper tree forest developed for commercial use in the 1970s, the flooded forest was now a nature reserve and home to a massive bird population. It was beautiful being rowed through the flooded forest, watching egrets and cranes take off from nests high above. The canals were incredibly narrow, and sometimes eerily dark – the perfect place for a horror film!
Exhausted after a long day, we stayed in Chau Doc; a small town effectively in the boarder with Vietnam. Famous for its smuggling activities of fuel and tax-free cigarettes from Cambodia, we were glad to be out of there the following morning on out express boat into Cambodia.