Phu Quoc

We got picked up from our hotel in Saigon by a lady with a bike helmet in her hand, and all the way through the walk through the alleyway Craig was convinced that she was going to try and get both of us with all 4 bags onto a motorbike. Luckily no, i don't know why she was holding a helmet but we got into a lovely airconditioned taxi. This dropped us at the main office of the bus company, we then had to change tickets and then hopped on another transfer bus to the main bus station. The main bus station was amazing, there were hundreds of buses but it was so well organised and not even in a chaotic way, all was calm. So you wait either outside or in the massive waiting room and all the buses pull up to the front door one by one with a guy announcing which bus it is. It was great, we hopped on on time at 9pm and had lovely single sleeper beds. I popped a valium and I was asleep by about 9.30pm, I woke up once when we stopped for a break and for some reason they put the bus through a massive bus wash, which was really noisy and quite a scary thing to wake up to, to be honest!

The next time I woke up we were being told we had arrived in Rach Gia and all off, so quite groggily and slowly we got off. When we looked at the time is was 2.30am, there had been some minibus type things waiting but they had all gone by the time we got fully conscious. So we traipsed to the office and after much confusion managed to get across that we should have a transfer to the ferry. A minibus appeared and off we went. Now the ferry did not leave until 8am and i had not realised that we would get there quite so early, but i did think that that the ferry place would have somewhere we could wait...........

Yep awesome, so we sat there for 5 hours, fun times. Eventually at about 7am the office opened and i went to change tickets again, only to be told by an old grumpy man that i was in the wrong place and told me that i should be at an address that had been written on the back of my receipt. It was clear that either he did not want to know or was just and arse because that address was the address for the office in Saigon, and that was quite clear. Anyway i then found another man who changed our tickets for us and showed us where to board. It was quite a nice boat a Superdong, anyway we left on time at 8am and by 10.30am we were pulling up to the island.

First a few words on Phu Quoc. Phu Quoc is a beautiful tropical island that the French handed to Vietnam when they were splitting their colony, French Indo-China and specifically the Mekong Delta between Vietnam and Cambodia. Phu Quoc is one of the largest islands in Vietnam and most of the accommodation is on the west side, on Long Beach. So we picked up a shared minivan and surprisingly the driver knew of some very cheap accommodation right on the beach, so off we went. It would seem that on Phu Quoc cheap is $15 a night, but surprise surprise they did not have that option, but they did have a $25 room. The lady promised me that if we took the $25 room that night there would be a $15 room available the following day. So because we are really lazy and i was bordering on zombified we took the room. Not before I am ashamed to say that I did raise my voice at the minibus driver, he had said 16,000 Dong each at the pier for the transfer and when we arrived at the guesthouse he asked for 60,000 Dong. I am well aware that they do this, thats why i asked him about 7 times at the pier "16 not 60", anyway I was very tired and suffice to say it was not one of my finer moments, its just so aggravating. The guesthouse is lovely, it does go right down to the beach and they have their own restaurant. The first picture is the $25 dollar room and then the i forgot to take a picture of the $15 but it was lovely, little brick building with bathroom, fridge, balcony, two hammocks and a view of the sea. I am finding there is not much more in life you need really.

Our first afternoon here we wandered a little dazed and tired along the beach. A few people had said that the island was beautiful but over developed and especially at Long Beach as that is where the "cheap" accommodation is. But actually it was not bad, all the development is off the beach and there are only one or two big hotels closer to town, all the other structures are little bungalows. Some look very luxurious and the place next door to us was asking $258 for a basic bungalow no air conditioning. But the overall look of the beach is nice, a lot of the buildings you cant see and those that you can have been designed really well.

 

The following day we decided to take a walk into town to see the market. It was really hot and very busy. The river runs through the middle of town and fishing is major business.  Phu Quoc fish sauce is a specific variety of fish sauce produced on Phu Quoc island. The waters around Phu Quoc island are rich in seaweed and plankton which provide food for the anchovy population. This resource has been used in the production of Phu Quoc fish sauce for over 200 years. Phu Quoc sauce is made exclusively from anchovies harvested from waters surrounding the island. During the fishing season (which extends from July to December), fishermen harvest anchovies by net, removing the anchovies from among other fish and items in the nets, and immediately combining them with salt at a 3:1 ratio in water tanks. These are some we saw drying by the road, and some pictures of the harbour.

 

 

On the other side of the river was the market, some markets you go to you know that in some way they are geared at tourists, this one definitely not so much. It was really smelly, hot, busy with people and bikes, noisy and there was no tourist tat.

After the market we hired a couple of motorbike guys to take us home and asked them about taking us to Sao Beach in the south of the island. It was about £12 for both us and it was about 30km, they would wait for us and then bring us back, there is also an old prison there that we wanted to see. So we asked them to come back the next day. 
 
The next day, you have never seen weather like it, the storm started at about 3am and rumbled on most of the day, that turned into a balcony day. The following day was lovely and at 10am our motorbike guys turned up to pick us up.

Here is some photo and video highlights of that and the following day that Craig & I hired a bike (don't panic, all was fine!) to go to the North of the island.

 

 

As you can see from the video Sao beach is stunning, the sand is perfectly white and so fine. The water is really clear, it really is picture perfect. BTW I am sorry, I am not trying to make people jealous but I do love these pictures, so there are a few!

The following day as I said Craig & I hired a bike and set off to the North of the island, whilst we heading through the National Park, we saw monkeys, butterflies, lots of lizards and so many types of bird. The problem is that when you are driving along a dirt rd at even 15km/h stopping is not instant and by the time i have hopped off and turned on the camera what ever it is, is gone. However there was one bird in particular that was so spectacular that I can't not show you a picture, its an Oriental Pied Hornbill. So yes this picture is from Google, but i saw this bird, a couple of times just flying about the jungle, how amazing is that?

Some of the Northern beaches were quite pretty but they just did not compare to Sao Beach and there was a lot of rubbish on them.

We saw this on the way home, I can think of worse spots for a final resting place.

We had by this point decided to stay another couple of days to do some snorkeling, and because we were enjoying all of the nature right on our balcony. There were lizards everywhere, we saw Flying dragons, Asian grass lizards, and Oriental garden lizards (they were the ones we could identify!)

The most impressive lizard of all however is living in our roof, he comes out every night and he is the size of a small crocodile. I was a little wary of him to start with now, but now we are all good, and its like having a pet, he comes out of an evening and sits on the wall, whilst we sit on the balcony. He is a Tokay Gecko and is a nocturnal arboreal gecko and he is the second largest Gecko species, getting to lengths of about 28–51 cm for males, and 18–48 cm for females, with weights of only 150–400 grams. I think he is pretty awesome! (Sorry about the quality of the pictures but he was a little camera shy, and my nighttime pictures without a tripod are usually pretty shocking!) - Update 10/05/13 pictures updated courtesy of my friend Oyla with a much better camera.

 

So on the second to last day we took the bike out again to Sao beach, this time with snorkels. The visibility was not amazing because the sky was quite hazy, but the variety of fish and coral was amazing. especially the coral, there were so many different types. I really love snorkeling but in a way it is a little scary here as there are things swimming around and attached to rocks that I cannot identify, and they might sting/ bite etc. My general rule of thumb is to just not touch anything, but sometimes things touch you, thats the bit i really don't like.
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here is just some random cute animals I couldn't help but have a cuddle with.

And a couple we met from London here on holiday.

We loved Phu Quoc Island, it had lovely beaches, lots of nature and it was very easy to get around with quiet roads. It is not too developed yet, but there is a lot of building of resorts and new roads going on, so it wont be long. I am glad that we saw the island the way that it is, as i don't think it will stay like this for long, they say that it has aspirations to be the new Phuket. That really is a crying shame, what a waste!

Next stop for us is a town called Can Tho to see some floating markets in the Mekong Delta. We leave tomorrow, so until then...................