Traveling from HCMC to Can Tho by bus

Route: HCM city center to Can Tho floating market

Date: 1 July 2019

Mode: Walking, Grab ride, Bus ride

Duration: around 3 hour

Fare: 130k dong

Difficulty: Communication with majority of locals

Highlight: Travel experience from the city to the countryside

 

My plan for today is to explore Can Tho which is a small city two-hours away form HCM known for the presence of a floating market village as seen in the mapsme.

I checked out of VyDa Backpackers hostel at 10:05. I had some few shots of photos with the receptionist upon check out. Then I decided to do a walking tour around the city again while canvassing for the money changer with good rate for my IDR. It turned out the money changers located only two blocks away.

Along the walking tour, I saw many empty but green spaces again. I tried to enter into residential areas also and tried their breakfast menu. Breakfast are served right in front of the porch of many residential areas. It is located along a narrow street. Along that street and other similar streets, there are small food stalls in front of the doors of houses. My breakfast was a plain rice and braised pork in sweet sauce. They also topped my rice with bola-bola with some local sauce. All in all I paid 30k dong. Pork is everywhere in HCM. Because I have not been eating pork in Indonesia for my entire stay there, I feel that eating pork in HCM is rather a strange way to eat.

After breakfast, I walked more and found some street food like a toasted sticky rice stuffed with coconut meat. I tried it and it tasted good. It is only 3k dong per piece. Along the way, I also found a money changer. I changed my 400k IDR to 560k VND. I discovered that it was very low compared to the one posted in google rate but need it at that moment so that I can already start my journey to Can Tho.

I walked further until I reached an intersection with green park and a Tourist Information Kiosk. I requested for a free wifi to book for my Grab ride. They gave me the passcode which is numbers one to nine. I booked for a ride going to Than Bu roi bus station @ 16k dong plus some tips. Upon arrival at the station, I immediately got a bus seat which leaves at 12:09. It leaves 10 minutes after my reservation. I got a 1 way Can Tho ride at 130k dong.

The bus departed from the private bus station and had a stop at a bigger government (public) bus station called Ben Xe Mien Tay. There, we transferred to another bus which goes to Can Tho, Cai Rang. The bus where we transferred is a lying-seater bus without toilet.

It rained along the early part of the trip. I tried to write while travelling. The bus is relatively peaceful, not bumpy, along the way. The bus has no free wifi and I could hardly find people speaking English. I was just lucky because I had a seatmate who was born in Vietnam but is now a Canadian. He gave me some information about the trip and gave me some tips about travelling there. He said that the trip is around 3 hours from HCM to Can Tho. We left Ben xe Mien Tay transportation hub at 12:50pm after 10 minutes of loading. The bus conductor gave bottled water.

The bus conductor checked my ticket and asked where to go in Can Tho. I sensed that they might send me to that destination through a free ride. I showed the map where the Cai Rang floating market is and he wrote it on his paper. My seatmate told me that the place is not too far from the bus station.

Along the way, we passed through a skyway. I also saw vast rice fields, many dragon fruit plantation. I remember that Cambodia also has some rice paddies along the way but both countries can never equal the rice paddies I saw in the Philippines. It made me wonder though why the Philippines still needs to import rice from Vietnam or Thailand. Some graveyards are seen at the middle of rice paddies. There are also santan flower plantation and sugarcane plantations seen. Some lines of coconut palms are also seen along with rice paddies. Some patches of banana plantation were also present.

We had a stop over at 14:05 at CX tran Than gas station. I bought bread at 10k dong. This is near My Tho as seen in mapsme. I took a pee at the toilet called nha ve sinh. Then the bus rolled again at 14:11. We passed by the long and high Cau Mai Thuan bridge at 15:10.

The bus arrived at the Can Tho terminal at 15:55. I was then told to ride a white van #15 for free sending me to Cai Ran floating market area. I decided to alight when I saw a river and a market place which was around 5 minutes from the bus station. I tried to walk and explore the place again. I ordered bread with some pork cuttings and some veggies stuffed (the veggies has a pungent aroma) for 10k dong.

I walked again crossing a bridge. I saw wood-processing factories along the way. By then, I was walking along the road which is parallel to the river where the Cai Rang floating market is.

I chanced upon Café Vong at Cho Noi. I sat down and ordered brewed coffee. I found nobody to speak with in English. We just communicate through sign language or using my finger to point to what I wanted. The coffee is unique because I have to wait for it to finish dripping before I can take a sip. I added a green tea bag on it and the combination gave a very rich unique aroma of a drink. It was 15k dong with wifi.

I completed my online coursera while drinking coffee and while using my cellphone. However, I could not get the certificate yet as I wait for my scholarship application which is released on 4 July 2019.

I realised that the night has settled in when I finished my online task so I started to look for a room to stay.