HCMC Trip (Part 2)

Almost 2 months since my HCMC trip, here I am to continue my stories... [Tight schedule, couldn't squeeze out time for blogging.]

After two nights spent in the non-tourist area, we were going to move to somewhere nearer to the town. As we couldn't check in too early, so we decided to hunt for food in this neighborhood. There is a school right beside our apartment, it seemed like so much of fun those kids having judging from their noise and laughter.

Along the road, there were a lot of stalls and shops selling varieties of local food. We picked a small stall selling beef noodle and banh mi as well. The name of the dish we ordered is Bo Kho Banh Mi. We know absolutely nothing about this dish, yet we gave it a try. Turned out it was some kind of 'bihun soup', it was really tasty! The banh mi (bread) didn't have the best outlook, it looked hard but it was really soft when you halves it. (We couldn't resist it, so we ordered another banh mi!)

Snapping nonsense photos in the room!

Beauties!

They don't look good but taste like heaven!

Shortly after breakfast, we took Grab car to Dist. 1 searching for our next accommodation. The room located in Luu Van Lang Shopping Street, right beside Ben Tanh market. The unique part of the room is we have to go through a shop selling shoes, using a tiny door inside the shop leading us up to staircases, then to our room. The staircases area looked ages, but what surprised us lying behind the door.

Spacious and nice decoration!

Always a loft house lover!

Right after settled down our stuff, we headed out for lunch. (Breakfast was too little to fill my stomach! I need more food!!) The restaurant we went named Ngoc Chao Garden. According to our itinerary planner, it is a nice home cooked Vietnamese food restaurant. They served varieties of Vietnamese local food with reasonable price. The dishes are all delicious, finger licking good!

Slurrppp! 

Always a food lover no matter which part of the earth I stood. XD

It was lunch hour during our visit to the restaurant. Thus, the tables on the ground floor were fully occupied. The waiter led us to the third floor. The stairways were slightly narrow and steep. We were again starving so we ordered almost all the dishes recommended by the waiter, and also from the TripAdvisor page. (The waiter and customers beside amazed by us again. XD)

After lunch, it's coffee time. This time we gave a try on Highlands coffee. There are a lot of branches distributed in HCMC. The taste of the coffee was good, but still a little overpriced. Next, we moved to the tourist area. The famous Church in Pink!

A must-take photo when visiting HCMC! Luckily while we were taking the photo not many tourists dropped by. Hence, we able to capture A LOT OF photos there, posing in front of the church. (well, these are just a small tiny piece from the iceberg! )

Post Office !!

It reminds me of the Gringotts Wizarding Bank!

The phone booth. 

It's old fashioned and I love it!

The City Cathedral

Always impressed with this!

Since we were in the central of Saigon, most touristy buildings are just within walking distance. We walked around 10 minutes to Hard Rock Cafe Saigon. From there, we again took Grab car to Cafe Apartment. Cafe apartment is an old building / flat, after renovation and remake, rented out to young people who wished to start up a small business in F&B field. Inside the building, you can either choose to take a lift or using stairs. With lift, you'll have to pay around 3000vnd. As we wished to explore the building floor by floor, so stairs it is.

Thinker & Dreamer

Cakes and Drinks! We paid for the environment and atmosphere. 

Girls power!

The desserts and drinks are not surprisingly tasty but rather normal or ordinary. So I guess the cost for the atmosphere and environment were added into the price of the dessert. After relaxing and photo session in the cafe, dinner will be the next destination. ( Non-stop of food and eating. This is us. XD)

Foursquare always lends me a hand while we ran out of ideas. Through foursquare, we found a restaurant named Propaganda. As the rating from the apps is really good, we decided to lay our taste buds there tonight.

The pork chop and duck curry are superb!! No regret!

After the delicious dinner, we went back to our house cleaned up before heading to backpacker street for nightlife! Randomly picked a place for drinks and blended ourselves in the city life. It was Monday we expected the street to be less crowded. We were wrong though. Not only foreigners but also the locals stayed up till late night on that street! 

The night is still young but long day walking around the city drained our energy completely. We left the street around 1 am after did some drinks and snacks shopping in the family mart. To my surprise, there was still quite a number of Grab car service in town at late hours! We grabbed our way back to our loft house and called it a day.

Next morning, Delta Mekong will be waiting for us! More to explore outside HCMC.

Exploration in a foreign country is always exciting especially with a bunch of awesome friends!

Spending (4 pax) :

-Bo Kho Banh Mi = 53,000vnd

-Ngoc Chao Garden lunch = 622,000vnd

-Highlands coffee = 123,000vnd

-Saigon Ol high tea = 230,000vnd

-Propaganda dinner = 624,000vnd

-Sahara Club = 550,000vnd

-Family mart = 129,500vnd

-Grabcar (whole day around city) = 142,000vnd

Planning to finish up the whole trip at first, but I am totally drained off right now. So, the final chapter of my HCMC trip will be in the next post. Stay tuned. =)