Phu Quoc island - Mekong Delta - Ho Chi Minh

Ha Tien is a small border town with an international border gate of about 8 km and an hour fast boat to Phu Quoc island. A million tourists are travelling across the township from Vietnam to Cambodia and the opposite way. 

Board a speed boat at Bai Vong Harbour, with tickets on hand (arranged by Vietnam Backroads Travel). The fast boat takes about an hour and 15 minutes to Ha Tien. Welcome to Ha Tien. Meet your guide and driver at the Speed boat harbour at 9: 30 am. Refreshment after the boat ride with Vietnamese coffee and fresh fruits before 1.5 hours drive along the Cambodia border to Ba Chuc village. Ba Chuc Massacre, Tri Ton, An Giang was the lousy result from the Red Khmer Revolutionary Army, and it was a sudden attack. There was more than three thousand farmers death. The attack was one of the events that prompted the Vietnamese Army to help the Official Cambodian Government defeat them all.

Take a walk with your guide to Memorial and a little museum, and study more about the Vietnam Army against Khmer Ruge and China after it began in 1978. Have lunch at a local restaurant before your journey continues to Tra Su forest. Travel on back roads, pass charming Khmer villages, rice paddy fields with many stop colourful Khmer temples and regional markets. Arrives at Tra Su forest, enjoy motorboat ride and sampan paddle to admire wildlife in the area. Then, you go to Chau Doc, check-in at the hotel and dine in town.

After breakfast, check out for today's travel to Can Tho. Just a short drive from hotel to Bassac River, and you have a floating village tour of the river. The floating fish raft village in Chau Doc is a lively tourist spot. You will experience local living at both floating and catfish farms. On your boat ride, you can see children go to & back from school by boats, and sampans carry food for fish every day, small grocery boats with long-tailed noise engines. Visit one of the catfish farms and learn how locals make many from growing fish.

Then the boat takes you to Cham village. Therefore, the original Chams are the likely heirs of Austronesian navigators from South Asia, whose main activities are commerce, transport, and piracy. Without forming an accurate leaving traces in written sources, they invested in the ports at the start of important trade routes linking India, China and Indonesian islands. In the 2nd century, they founded the kingdom of Champa, which Vietnam gradually absorbed.

Afterwards, you return your car and depart to Can Tho. Stop at the crocodile farms, visit the farm, have lunch in town, and keep on travelling to Binh Thuy for a short visit of the ancient house with colonial exterior architecture blended oriental interior designed. It was a landlord house and built-in 1870. Now the six generations of the Duong family living in. Finally, take a rest on vehicle transfer to Can Tho.

The floating markets had been seen in many places in the Mekong Delta early 19 century during the Nguyen Dynasty, and before 1975 farmers were unable to travel without sampan due to the vast natural network of the Mekong River. So the waterway had become the main transport for hundred years with the business alongside the rivers.

After breakfast, you board a boat at Ninh Kieu Pier to Cai Rang to see its market in action. In the morning, the market is full of hundreds of boats packed with fruits, vegetables,  and food: mainly farm products and specialties of Cai Rang urban District and neighbouring rural Districts. Fruits and vegetables are seasonal, depending on the time of year. Many tiny sampans sell breakfast, and some selling coffee, soft drinks even lottery tickets.

Then the boat leaves the floating market behind and cruises on canals and small rivers through the countryside of Phong Dien. This is an opportunity to experience local life on waterways and enjoy the beautiful backwaters of the rural areas. Stop at some local business making rice noodles and local snacks. Then return to the hotel to shower and check out for 3.5 hours drives to Saigon. Tour End! Cycling Tour Mekong Delta