Hello Can Tho.
Room with a view - 21 floors up.
Can Tho, Vietnam’s fourth largest city, is considered the capital of the Mekong Delta and while it has a charming enough waterfront, the city itself hasn’t got a great deal to occupy visitors.
As we journey our way up the Mekong, the reason we came to Can Tho was to see the floating markets. I read there were a few scams down on the quayside so we paid for a legitimate guide and got ready for our 5.00 A.M. adventure.
Our Captain - Mrs You.
We boarded our small boat owned by Mrs You and off we went with our guide. After 30 mins of cruising, the sun rose as we got nearer to the market. The Cai Rang market is described as “authentic riverside culture through the "mobile apartments" on the river, see how merchants juggle goods from boat to boat, and the traditional music in the bustling market.”
So the reality is actually quite different. Our guide kept insisting that it was the biggest market, Yes it was getting smaller but it’s the best and biggest. Well there were not many active merchant boats or sampans, no bustling, no music and no atmosphere. It felt as though it was well past its sell by date.
I was pleased we were on a small boat with Mrs You who had been working on the waterways all her life, at least that was authentic. Other tourists were on big boats that ripped through the water with someone shouting into a microphone or playing party music. All tourists are rowed to a noodle soup boat then to a pineapple boat. Then you are visited by the coffee boat. These people are the ones making the money, not the market traders.
A small boat market trader Vs the tourist river boat shuffle.
Coffee shop boat.
There were various transactions happening between some boats and we got to see a glimmer of what life was once like on the Mekong. But ultimately it was very disappointing.
We were advised by our hotel not to eat the noodle soup so this messed up the guides itinerary. Mrs You took us for a gentle cruise through the canal waterways where we then visited a noodle factory which was quite interesting but you didn’t feel particularly welcome. Then we went to a fruit farm which was quite expensive to go in, but apparently the karaoke singer is very good.
Due to the lack of activity in the market and lack of eating by us we were going to be finished really early, so Mrs You was more than happy to take us back to the market and get a little closer to the merchant boats now the giant tourists boats had left.
Each of the merchant boats has a pole with the produce they are selling attached like a shop sign.
Most people had packed up but we did see some activity and we went onboard to have pineapple which was very tasty.
Immediately a sampan rocked up and out jumped a very smiley lady and produced lots of bracelets she was selling. As we left we saw inside the hull of the boat where the family live when it’s not crammed with 70 thousand pineapples. Living on the boats must be hard.
There is another floating market - Phong Dien, which only allows small boats for traders and visitors. The tourists aren’t offered this as a tour as it is a further 30 mins away and you can’t make as much money from a small boat. I’m wondering if the tour operators use images from here to promote Cai Rang?
Another issue about this market area is the amount of rubbish and plastic that’s floating in the water. There is now a system, partly sponsored by Coca Cola, to clear up the waterways but it’s still got a way to go. As we turned into the canal where the back of the homes overhang the waterways it was a serene, lush backdrop, punctuated by the canal banks laden with trash that has banked up and the floating water hyacinth tangled with rubbish.
This idyllic scene is littered with rubbish almost camouflaged by the backdrop.
This appears to be a rubbish holding area.
Huge quantities of water hyacinth move along the Mekong acting like a magnet to the rubbish.
On our way from Cai Rang, plastic bags got caught in the rudder and Mrs You had to disentangle them. Rather than keep the trash on the boat to dispose of later, she just threw it back into the river.
This is definitely a tour that the operators are promoting based on past experiences or even another market. The cost of one of these tours can be huge and ultimately the experience in my opinion is a disappointment and completely oversold. I came away feeling quite saddened by it all.
Farewell Can Tho, we have a boat to catch at Cha Doc.