It’s a long way to get to Ho Chi Minh, but well worth it. The city is vibrant, colorful and chaotic plus the people are super friendly. Thankfully we had great flights and a really nice hotel, the Marriott, to recover from the jet lag. The Marriott is in a perfect location to explore the city. It’s an easy walk to most of the popular tourist destinations, but be prepared for the heat, humidity and pollution from all the cars/scooters (we wore masks, as do most of the locals).

Book Street

Book Street is located right across from the Marriott so I explored this street several times. The street is a pedestrian only zone and there are lots of book stalls to explore. Most of them are books in Vietnamese, but there are a few English bookstores. This is also a popular destination for wedding and lifestyle photographs.

Museum of Fine Arts

This was the farthest place I had to walk to and when I arrived I found out you could only pay the admission fee in cash, so I had to go find an ATM. Surprisingly the museum is not air conditioned, which is not ideal conditions for the artwork, as well as exploring an art museum. There is some amazing art here and the building is beautiful, but it was sad to see it in such poor condition.

Street Scenes

We always enjoy walking around a new city. It’s the best way to get to know a city, the culture and the people. The one thing that really stuck out was the amount of non-stop traffic and if you’re a pedestrian you have to watch out for motorcycles/scooters on the sidewalks and that traffic won’t necessarily stop for you in crosswalks.

Flowers

View of Ho Chi Minh from the Saigon SkyDeck

War Remnants Museum

This museum is well worth the visit. The War Remnants Museum is about the Vietnam War with exhibitions on the war atrocities, Agent Orange, and the photographers who covered the war. The war atrocities and Agent Orange exhibits were very difficult and emotional to explore, so much so that I couldn’t look at the entire exhibits. The exhibition on the photographers was extremely interesting and there were hundreds of the their photographs to explore.

Independence Palace (Reunification Hall)

This is the location of the Fall of Saigon and the end of the Vietnam War. We enjoyed visiting here, but there was not a lot of information on the rooms or displays so I’m not sure we were able to grasp the historical significance of the site.

Saigon Central Post Office & Notre Dame

The Post Office and Notre Dame are right next to each other and are located by Book Street. Notre Dame was closed for renovations so we didn’t get to see the inside, but the Post Office was fun to wander around.

Our first day in Vietnam I enjoyed a session of yoga in a rooftop garden at the Marriott. It was a great way to start the trip! We had a great time in Vietnam, we wish we had more time to explore more of the country.