July 30th, 2018
Things sloooooowed down today July 29th, 2018
Not too much to report today. Troy and I went to Jaspa’s for breakfast and it was really good, expensive but good (225,000 Dong for omelette), then around 11am, Ritchie, Alice and Landon came to hang out with us at the rooftop pool today. It cost them 360,000 dong ($18) each, but Ritchie assures me this is a bargain for the area. All pools are really expensive and he had paid 2 million dong for he, Vanna and Alice at another hotel a while back. It was really nice to relax and just hang out. Alice loves water so it was built in entertainment for the entire afternoon.
At check in, we were given a voucher for two free drinks at Liquid Sky bar (the rooftop bar at the hotel). I asked if we could use it at the pool bar and they said “sure”. So Troy and I ordered lime margaritas. I just don’t get why they can’t make a decent mixed drink here. It was really awful and Ritchie even said at one point “I can smell the petrol”. He’s British, so he’s really saying “it smells like gasoline”. So it kind of takes me back to the drinks that Troy and I ordered in Hoi An last year that were SO bad (and I thought tasted like gas) so I sent them back! NOT that I know what gas tastes like! But one can certainly imagine…..but when you didn’t pay in the first place, how do you send it back?? Probably using the cheapest tequila on the planet…..
It made my tummy a little woozy to look down the center of the hotel from the 21st floor…..
We were going to try to get a reservation at 4P Pizza, but when Landon called, the earliest we could get in was 9pm. Given that Alice had skipped nap due to pool and all we’d had to eat since breakfast at 10am was peanuts, nobody was going to wait that long to eat. So we decided to go back to the food market that we stopped at on our first day here over by the local market. It would be fast and it had a huge selection of vendors to choose from so everyone could get what they liked. I almost immediately became overwhelmed with the choices so randomly chose a rice and pork dish that I was colossally disappointed in. It had pork skin on it (which is disgusting) and kimchee. Which is WAY too spicy for me! Troy got ribs and I was super jealous. BUT….I was saving myself for dessert anyway. I had seen mango sticky rice when I scoped the stalls out, so I knew what I was having after the fail of a supper. Best 70,000 dong I spent all day!
We walked over to Bui Vuen street (the famous backpacker street). I’ve never seen anything like this! Thousands and thousands of people hanging out, drinking, partying, loud booming competing music from every bar, food, vendors, people inhaling helium out of balloons (how is that even a thing??), drugs I’m sure……apparently it goes until 4am and even 5am. But there are hundreds of hostels and backpacker rooms on this road…..how does anyone sleep??? Guessing sleep (at night anyway) isn’t a priority for anyone who chooses a room on this street?
We chose a rooftop bar with a visibly more mature clientele (because that’s how WE see ourselves!) and we had a lovely time on our last night in Saigon.
TTFN
