Da Nang, Vietnam; Siem Reap, Cambodia; Saigon (Ho Chi Minh City), Vietnam…a whirlwind four days. We docked at Chan May, Vietnam as a drop-off point for our brief tour of Da Nang and a place to pick up a plane to Siem Reap. Chan May is not much more than a large commercial pier lying about halfway between Hue and Hoi An. Hue is the ancient Vietnamese capital and Hoi An is a medium-sized city that is one of Vietnam’s cultural centers. Da Nang gained fame during the Vietnamese War (known in Vietnam as the American War) as a major US airbase and R&R center – think: China Beach.

We docked at Chan May, the access to Da Nanag, then flew to Siem Reap for the Angkor Wat visit. Then we flew from Siem Reap to Saigon.

Our day began early with a bus ride into Da Nang and a visit to the local market. This visit was quite different from our Indonesian and Malaysian market visits. This market teemed with people and was many, many times larger. They also sold everything from food and staples to clothing, religious objects, and art work, to local crafts. After the market we made a too brief stop at the XQ Embroidery Factory. This three-story building houses a retail store on the first floor, an embroidery factory where young women produce extraordinary works of embroidered artwork on the second floor, and an embroidery school on the third floor. If we had had a little more time, I am confident we would have walked away with a true keepsake piece of embroidered artwork. As it was, this was merely a short stop to showcase one of the finer gifts of Vietnamese culture.

We them stopped at the Cham Museum and a marble “factory.” The Cham Museum was probably quite interesting, but Bonnie and I were too tired from the market walk and the embroidery factory to even take the tour. We made camp in the coffee shop, had Cokes, visited the Museum Shop, and relaxed. The marble factory was a joke. It seemed to us to be just another shot at buying local craftsmanship. While the work was indeed beautiful and many pieces were quite intricate, we just couldn’t see buying a four-foot tall carved marble animal (or small person) and having to wither tote it home or ship it. Besides, it was just not to our taste. We would have preferred to have had more time at the embroidery factory.

Our final stop before lunch was at a cave that had become a Buddhist shrine. The most interesting thing about this cave is that during the Vietnam War it housed a Viet Cong hospital. We were told that the US troops stationed near the base of the mountain holding the cave had no idea what was underfoot.

I had to add this picture of the Da Nanag "Dragon Bridge." It really is an embellishment along the center of the bridge in the form of a huge dragon...

Lunch was at the Sandy Beach Resort Hotel located right in the middle of the area famous as “China Beach.” It was a very good lunch of Vietnamese food and we had a short time to explore the beach. Just like home…

Finally, Silk Air (a subsidiary of Singapore Airlines) commuter jet to Siem Reap and the start of our Angkor Wat Cambodian adventure. This was the real reason for the trip and has been one of our “bucket list” items for a long time. The flight was an uneventful hour and a half. Cambodia was, however, as different from Vietnam as a lion is from a lamb. For instance, in Vietnam the immigration process was well-ordered and vey quick. We were in and out of the security lines at a fast pace and all of the various government functionaries knew exactly what he or she was to do. They did it and everyone moved on. Siem Reap was, however, more of a Cambodian fire drill. We were stopped at the entry to the terminal because we did not have our “health paper.” Where was the health paper? Why, of course, it was on a table next to the official, but it was not his job to hand it out, that was for someone else and apparently, the two of them were not speaking… Then we were told to surrender our passports to another official who would take care of our visas. IF you have ever traveled out of the US, then you know that the first rule is “Do not EVER voluntarily give up your passport – even to a seemingly-official government agent.” After many reassurances from our guide/interpreter and the ship’s escort, we did give up the passports. This was not going to be a good night’s sleep… We were told that we would get them back the next day with the visa attached.

Siem Reap is a small city by Asian standards with about 1.5 million people. It became obvious very quickly that as knowledge and renown attached to the Angkor Wat and Angkor Thom complexes, the city became exceedingly tourist-friendly, while still trying to sustain the hordes of people flocking to take advantage of the new-found notoriety. One thing I couldn’t help but notice was how the traffic in both Vietnam and Cambodia seems to flow like some sort of divinely-orchestrated ballet. The mix consists of pedestrians, bicyclers, motor scooters, motorcycles, “Tuk-Tuks” (motorcycles with a two-wheeled cart attached), the relatively few cars, and buses in three sizes (small electric eight to ten passenger, medium sized similar to those you see at airport rental car terminals, and large city bus types). These disparate vehicles and humans seem to weave in and about one another with little or no direction. The traffic signs (what there are of them) and the two traffic signals we saw in Siem Reap appear to be more suggestions than directions. Although I am told that all vehicles are equipped with turn signals, there was little evidence that anyone knew of their existence (sort of like being home in season…). Bikes, cycles, mopeds, and buses crossed, turned, started and stopped while dodging each other. We were in a large bus and I cannot imagine what it must be like at ground level in a Tuk-Tuk or on a bike.

Our base in Siem Reap was the Sokha Angkor Hotel and Spa. This was a slightly older hotel, with four-star amenities and service, and was less glitzy than several of the newer hotels that lined the strip in from the airport. Also lining that strip were wall-to-wall shops, restaurants, tourist “boutiques,” and every type of establishment designed to separate a tourist from his $$$. OK, it was not Las Vegas, but it was a jarring reminder that every place that invites tourism is prone to inviting the ancillary businesses as well. The Sokha Hotel has a lot of local artwork and crafts as décor and is decorated to look more local than western. Our dinner that evening was a very good buffet of both Asian and western dishes. Of course, Bonnie and I concentrated on the Asian food.

The next morning we began our Angkor Wat adventure for real. I will follow up with another post on that part of the trip.