My Tho

General thoughts:
Whenever I visit a new place, all my senses are open and I judge whether I would want to live there. I just do that subconsciously. I guess I do it because I have moved so often.

I visited My Tho twice. It didn't do anything for me. I expected I would like it a lot because I like the river, but it seemed a bit shabby, not at all modern, nothing much to look at. Lots of tourist buses park at the waterfront to dump tourists on boats, they come back and the buses leave. In that sense My Tho seemed like a conduit not a destination.

We rented a motorbike and I'll tell you what I did like: the big island. Go over the suspension bridge and exit. There is a skinny road the length of it. Cute little houses, flowers and plants everywhere, locals are laid back. The east end has some of those honey farms or whatever the tourists go to by boat, but few tourists walking around, that day.

Another Mekong town I liked better than My Tho was VInh Long. Better waterfront for hanging out and watching boats, big market - fruit bonanza - and lots of people out at night. Close to Can Tho too. Pretty sure I could live there for awhile.

gobot wrote:

We rented a motorbike and I'll tell you what I did like: the big island.

You are absolutely right about this lovely place.  My wife and I toured it once when we were not pressed for time on our way back from her hometown of Ben Tre.  She thought it might be a nice place for us to buy a home as it was close enough for her to see her mother when she wanted to but sufficiently far enough away that her mother would not be visiting too frequently.    She had never been there because in her youth the ferry that she took did not stop there.  Believe it or not, as a teen during the post war neo-Stalinist period she was a smuggler of sugar, which was a rationed item but more available in Ben Tre than My Tho.   I don't know what they would have done to her as a teenager if she had been caught.  It certainly would have been embarrassing for her father who was a party member.  Now that the bridge is in, it would be a practical place to live as you could have convenient access to the city but still be in a quiet country environment.  I have a strange love for ferry boats but they would not be good in a medical emergency.

I don't know if you could call it an attraction, but visitors to My Tho should try the local coffee which is branded as Bao Minh.  This is the same name as a big insurance company that insures many of the coffee plantations in the highlands but I don't know if that is the connection.  Bao Minh (#2 blend is most common) reinforces my experience from Hawaii that a good brand is only 20% in the beans and 80% in the roast.  This brand gets it just right.

Vinh long, we like to visit as well, but not live.  If I had a choice, it would be country side south of Can Tho.  I saw some of the most beautiful landscapes that I have seen in VN.  We like Da Nang alot and home in the countryside not far from Da Nang would be very desirable as well.