Day 240 - Cruising on the Mekong Delta

Oh my goodness, it's 5am - though waking even hour stressed that our alarm wouldn't wake us, had prepared us well for it! We hurried downstairs to be greeted by our boatman for the day, who wasted no time in thrusting a bag of bread and bananas in our hands and whisking us off to the wharf. The bananas were so tiny and cute, we almost felt bad eating them! But we needed breakfast and gobbled them up as we waited for the sun to cast its light over the river. We were treated to a fusion of colours that appeared with the sun as it pierced its way through the clouds. After an hour floating along the river we arrived at Cai Rang - the biggest floating market in the Mekong Delta. The reason we had to leave so early is that the markets are at their best between 6-9am and we didn't want to miss all the action. Daily life here centres around the rivers where everybody sells, buys, and exchanges their fruit, veges and flowers all while drifting atop the river. There is no apparent organisation to this commotion, but it all seems to work out as larger boats seem to anchor themselves in one place while an army of smaller boats putt or row their way to where they need to go - banging into each other along the way.
After being right in the middle of the chaotic and exciting atmosphere of people enjoying their daily work, we zipped down a small canal to a ricepaper / noodle-making factory. Here we wandered around almost unnoticed by the workers who were focused on their individuals tasks involved in making the noodles.
We continued up the mighty Mekong, our small boat (only 6m long and 1.5 wide) rocking each time a bigger boat passed by - but our master driver managed to steer us in the right way each time to avoid capsizing into the murky brown waters. We passed houses along the way, built in the traditional manner of using any available material and built up on stilts to keep the rising waters away - flooding is growing problem in the area, partly due to deforestation. If this was anywhere else in the world, and the river was cleaner, people would pay big bucks to have the chance to build their houses along the riverfront!

We made our way to Phong Dien floating market, more than 20km from our starting destination, in time to catch the commerce going on there as well. The Phong Dien market is not as big as the Cai Rang market, but was impressive and interesting in its own right, and was more pleasant to cruise around in because of the lack of big boats.
From here we headed back down stream and turned off into a shady, winding canal lined with mangrove forests. Here we stopped at a fruit orchid for a drink and some longan fruit before getting back on the boat for our return trip. We continued down the canal until we hit the point where it was too shallow for us to continue, so headed back the way we came through Cai Rang - the water was so calm along the canal, that when we made it back onto the made river again we noticed more and more river spray reaching us as the wind and waves picked up.

Along the way Adam settled in for a beer he had brought along, which he finished by the time we made it to Cai Rang, so we set about finding a floating bar to restock and bargained for a pineapple from one of the many fruit boats still hanging around. Sitting back with pineapple and beer in hand, we continued our cruise towards the finish line. Our trip back was slowed down when Adam needed to jump into the bush for natures calling - and in the process lost his hat overboard again!! Luckily on this slow boat (our engine was a small lawnmower engine with a pole and a prop connected to it) we could make a pick-up!

Back on dry land we went back to our Mekong regular eating spot before picking up some icecreams and beers to people watch the night away on the waterfront - including an 85 year old woman making flax swans and though we are unlikely to give money to beggars the smile on this woman's face was enough to convince us to buy one.

Adlibing the mighty Mekong waterways.