Saigon in August

Saigon is rapidly changing, with whole streets seeming to change as the city begins to feel the dynamics of the economic revival occurring. The changes in the city in but three years are incredible, and nowhere does it seem so more than along Nam Ky Khoi Nghia and Dong Koi. Seemingly overnight new hotels, high rises, strip malls, cafes, and high end boutiques are appearing. But as much as some things change—the older parts of the city remain as full of life as ever!

Quick Tips:

No matter what time of day, you can just expect to harassed on every corner by scooter drivers asking if you want to ride. Just smile, say "No", and keep walking.

If you breakdown and buy the postcards, fans, or trinkets that a kid is selling, you have just become a magnet for all the other kids to move towards to buy from them.

Taking a cab to get around is very cheap in HCMC. Make sure you go ahead and nail the price down on any trips that depart the city center—before getting in the taxi.

The best time to go to the Ben Thanh Market is in the morning. Expect to spend at least a few hours going through it and seeing all the stalls. Its a great place to buy a bigger bag at a cheap price to carry everything you bought back home.

Best Way To Get Around:

Though I did take a life threatening ride on a motorbike, the best way to get around tends to be by cab. Hiring a cab for a full day can be pretty cheap if you can get the right price, and often can be a pretty good experience in what you can learn about the city. Its definitely does help having someone who can speak Vietnamese! The basic layout of the city is by Districts. Sometimes its easier to think of it more as three areas - when looking at where to go in the city and layouting out what you are going to see by those three groupings.

At close to $70 a night for an online reservation, the Hotel Rex is on the high end. It would have been a lower rate had I stopped by the travel agents of vietnamtourist.com.

I had seen a lot of reviews in regards to all the construction around the Rex, but I had a room were it did not bother me. I stayed 2 nights last year in the Rex, and loved the roof top garden and pool and the view up there of Nguyen Hue at night. I also liked the massive breakfast spread that they offer, which is about as good as it gets! You also get an hour of complimentary online time at the hotel coffee shop. This year I stayed a few more nights at the Rex while visiting friends in Saigon. The room was not large but was comfortable enough. The room safe did not work, and after a comedy of errors for an hour with the floor staff it was replaced.

What I really like most about the Rex is the staff, and that is the reason why I will stay there again. A good hotel becomes a great one by the actions of the hotel staff in taking care of guests. Hospitality is the name of the game at the Rex, and from the doormen to the girls that greet you to the desk clerks, this is a top notch friendly hotel. From helping me with my room to helping me get around the city, everyone there was positive and greatly helpful. I especially was grateful for all the assistance and help from Ms Nguyet, Ms Yen, Ms Vy and Ms Mi. Make sure you ask Nguyet where the best places to get ice cream are, and she will point you in the right direction!

Finding the Continental booked up during my initial stay last month in Saigon was a surprise. The day may have now passed when you could walk in and always find a room there. While staying in HCMC, I did visit Vietnam Tourism and got a great rate for a night at the Continental for when I returned there from my trip to Hanoi. Often you will find high end prices on other hotel Internet sites.

The Continental Hotel was the first place I stayed at in Saigon three years ago, and I have always wanted to return and stay again. I can think of no better place to really bring about the feeling of being in Saigon than looking out the window at night at the continious flow of motor-scooter traffic crossing the Opera House Square past the Continental.
The Continental Hotel offers the feel of the past, and probably the one place that just seems to keep bringing the word Indochineese to your mind! You really are paying for an experience when you stay at the Continental -and a very good experience at that. The rooms are huge and have high ceilings with comfortable beds and a/c units that really can keep the place cool.

The front desk upgraded me to an Orient Suite, and I found myself with a hotel room the size of the living room of my house and a balcony looking directly down onto the Opera House Square and the lively pageant of traffic passing at night. It was incredible!

The center hotel terrace was under construction, so I was not able to take breakfast out there as I had done in the past. That to me was truly a cool experience on my first stay, one that feels like you are in a different age. They do have a good breakfast spread, and excellent coffee!

The staff at the Continental are very friendly and extremely helpful. I was especially happy that I was allowed a late check-out because of a late afternoon flight to Singapore. The Business Center has several computers - nothing fast about them, but you can check your emails there for a price. (If it is taking to long to log in - do ask to switch computers!)

There may be many new hotels springing up in Saigon, but I look forward to my next stay in the Continental!

After a few days or weeks in Vietnam, some folks might just want something like Bar-b-que. If you have never had real Texas bar-b-que - then you are definitely in for a treat by stopping in and having lunch or dinner at Texas-Bar-B-Q.

I first stopped in to the Texas Bar-B-Q last year-and proud to say I am an often returning customer these days there every time am in Saigon. There is a reason for that - and that is that Wayne -the owner -does serve up smoked bar-b-que that would give any place in Texas a run for its money - and no place in Hawaii comes even into the same league! It might take a moment or two to get over seeing Vietnamese waiters/waitresses in cowboy hats and seeing a lot of folks drinking Coors beer (this is Saigon after all were Tiger and 333 beer is king) -but this here is Texas eating as good as it gets. If it's hard to believe that the best fall off the bone smoked ribs and perfect brisket this side of Texas is actually in Saigon. With one try of these and you will probably agree with me and the crowd of people in there every evening! Top it off with the que sauce there is top notch.

The crowd, and there is a big crowd, these days is mostly Vietnamese couples or families in the early evening, but you can usually find the Expats of all types here as well -in the back at the bar eating the ribs or having the brisket sandwich. The reason behind this place being so good is that Wayne spent many a year on on the U.S. bar-b-cue competition circuit -and that he has his spices sent over from Texas.

Open from 6am to 11pm, the Tex-Mex foods here are a change of pace from the rest of Saigon! Never mind that the chips are made of rice flour-the salsa is great. Its the chunky type with great taste and just enough heat to remind you to get another beer. Make sure you try the Cajun curly fries as well-and a bowl of their Texas chili is definitely a meal in itself. Mail: texasbbq@hcm.fpt.vn  

Do not be surprised if Ngon is the restaurant of choice that friends in HCMC mention when thinking about taking you out to eat. That was just the case with friends of mine—and it was an excellent call on their part. Ngon is the place to eat that sets the standard for other Vietnamese restaurants to follow in HCMC.

The restaraunt specializes in the regional foods from throughout Vietnam. The menu is pages long, and included so many different type foods—making the final choices end up being a group effort and a lot of fun. Even with the diverse tastes of our group ordering, there was nothing that ranked below really good in what was brought out to our table. Actually, it was delicious—and we soon ended up with a table full of food from the northern provinces and the central highlands that soon disappeared. Amongst so many great choices—don't overlook the spring rolls or any of the vegetable dishes!

Ngon is located in a colonial style building and has great decor through out. Its location is not far from the Reunification Palace. The service ranged from really good to excellent, and the waitresses took great care of the diner parties.

Ngon is an extremely popular—and expect to wait for a table. But the wait is well worth it! So are the prices!

With several floors of small dining rooms, Lemongrass is a great place for taking guests out to eat in Central HCMC. It was actually a quiet and very friendly place. A friend of mine and I dined on the 2d floor, which was really nice looking and well decorated. It is a place that you can dress casual - but most of the crowd in there will be dressed a notch above that.

The prices are a little high for what one might spend in Vietnam, but the food is such that you can not go wrong with anything on the menu that you order. There were several dishes we wanted to try, and we ended up ordering several things that looked to be pretty good. Several of the appetizers were very good, and it was hard not filling up before the main dishes came out. Of those main dish items, the chicken with lime leaves turned out to be our favorite and gets a high recommendation from both of us.

A friend of mine highly recommended I stop by and have a beer at the Chu Bar on Dong Khoi. It's more of an upscale kind of cigar bar place, staffed by about nine fun and really cute girls working as bartenders who made sure that your beer tends to never runs dry. The bar itself is a large dark wood oval one with about 25 chairs and the eight charming ladies all working behind it as bartenders. There is a 2nd floor with a small restaurant, but the bar, as well as the tables and benches in the corner areas, are the main feature. The bartenders can be a lot of fun and were very quick on the drinks and peanuts. There is a full cocktail list, plus wines, hard liquors, and cigars. You may want to see what they have from Cuba if your looking at cigars.

Each night they tended to have a special on one type of hard liquor or cigar and two gals tasked to sell that item. If you are hungry for some fresh tropical fruits—you can get them at the bar as well. The bar menu offers items such as grated green papaya, mango, and dried beef salad. There is a live band each night, and they ranged from good to okay. It was difficult speaking and hearing when the band was playing if you are sitting at the back of the bar nearest to the band. I ended up visiting the Chu Bar several nights - and look forward to the next visit there.

With only a month's head start on knowing when my vacation would be, I took the fast mail route on a $65 visa for Vietnam through their embassy in Washington DC. I sent it in 2 weeks beforehand and got it back just days before I flew to Southeast Asia on my trip. There are now a lot of direct international links into HCMC, and gateway flights are from Singapore, KL, Taipei, and Tokyo, and Korea now, as well as Bangkok. Unfortunately, the flood of new tourists has not changed up the rate or number of immigration control officers at Tan Son Nhat. Here is an airport that you do want to be first off the plane at! This is also a place where its better to hit the restroom before you land, because the wait in line may be well over an hour, and you are not going to want to get out of it and join another line. People waiting on you outside know that it will take you an hour to get through customs and get your bag. The rule of the road is if you get through immigration fast, you will have the last bags coming out.

My first time into Vietnam, I was unsure how the immigration officers would act and was a bit intimidated, but I have not had a problem in three trips there. After you go through immigration, you will pass by some duty free shops. If you are meeting Vietnamese friends and want to pick up a bottle of something or chocolates, you can do it as you are going to pick up your bags. It's sometimes a surprise how long it takes your bags to get through, but collecting them and showing the ticket is all pretty easy. There is an exchange before you go out the door; fork over about $20 there and you are set. The culture shock for Vietnam begins as you pass through the doors and you see hundreds of people waiting.

Unfortunately, the first people you tend to meet are folks I call "snakes". A "snake" is a cab driver who moves in and preys on tourists arriving in country and harangues and harasses them into riding with him – usually at a rate that is up to 50% above what the guys waiting in the crowd will charge. In Saigon, a couple of them will immediately move forward to you as soon as you clear through the doors. I usually push past them, saying I already have a ride and go on to the taxi stand and negotiate for the ride with them. I had a snake charge me $20 for a ride to a downtown hotel – after a breakneck ride that rivaled anything out of the Dukes of Hazzard. You should be able to get a cab for less than $15 (counting tip).

Returning to the airport, you find a crowd outside again – but not one after you go through security. There is a $12 exit fee from Vietnam that you will need to pay and later present this when going through immigration. There are few stores or shops in the airport, but you can purchase some last-minute Ben Tre coconut candies at the bigger duty-free Store. Food items in there are priced only a bit higher than outside – the rest of the items I hope you already got in the many markets of Saigon!

If you are flying to another city in Vietnam, you do not have to pay the fee. One item of interest was that the weights of bags on Inter-Vietnam flights was different than International flights, so you may have to pay $1 or $2 for overweight bags. The airlines will point you to counter 22 or 23 and have you go there to pay the money and then return to collect your boarding pass.