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  1. #26
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    Brilliant thread - once again I'm being spoilt reading the tales of another kind enough to share

  2. #27
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    I delayed reading this thread until I had time to do it justice and I'm glad I did. Wonderful work. The way you've integrated the fine photos and videos make it one of the best travel pieces ever.

    Well done.

  3. #28
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    Glad to see you enjoy the pics and video clips – they aren’t the best quality since I take them all on my mobile phone. I really wished I had a better camera for some of the places I visited next.

    Anyway, back to the road …

    Phu Quoc Island

    After the big night before I was a little shaky at 6.00am for the flight to the island. First thing I remember about that morning was arriving at Phu Quoc Island airport. Anyway we were rushed off to check into the Kim Hoa Resort as we had a lunch meeting, which no doubt was going to mean more grog. The Vietnamese men love to drink during working hours, well I guess anytime for that matter and I’ve seen one or two heated arguments later in the afternoon when the drinks start to kick in a bit.


    ^ Arriving at Phu Quoc Island Airport – you forget how the bright the sun can be when you spend most of your time in Asian cities


    ^ Entrance to the Kim Hoa Resort on Phu Quoc Island – I had no idea at this time how friggin magnificent this joint was gunna be


    ^ After checking in I was taken down to my beach front bungalow – this was the first view I got looking southwest off the front deck


    ^ Then I looked northwest – bloody no-one there except the hired help picking up any trash that may wash ashore – I thought it was okay for US$30 a night


    ^ The pool wasn’t bad – check out all the tourists lazing around the place


    ^ Some small bungalows – these are set off the beach a bit and I think US$15-20 a night


    ^ Some other rooms in the resort for about $15 a night – everything is say 20-30 metres from the sand

    After this we had about an hour to kill and we were rushed up a dirt track behind the beach to check out a souvenir centre. Apparently the island has a strict policy on the selling of tourist shit, and it can only be sold in centres such as this away from the beach. In fact this is about the only place you can get anything to take back home – far cry from the Andaman or Chang Islands these days and it was a real pleasure not being bugged every 2 minutes to buy something. The place sold local handicrafts, and the owner had incorporated a museum and dog farm into the place – no not for eating - for producing the famous Phu Quoc hunting dog.


    ^ Magnificent country up at the old handicraft centre


    ^ Most of this hill side land is uninhabited – apparently it is quite easy for foreigners to buy land there too


    ^ Handicraft store – all very nice and cheap but old Wayne Kerr kept his wallet in his pocket


    ^ The Phu Quoc Island hunting dogs. They are native to the island and the owner breeds them and sells most to mainland buyers – they have a big ridge running down their backs


    ^ Dolphin skeleton – certain communes on the island used to eat these


    ^ This is a dugong skeleton – these are still eaten on some of the small islands off the south of Phu Quoc


    ^ These marine turtles are for sale everywhere on the island – I’d buy one but it would be a huge fine should you be caught bringing it back into Thailand

  4. #29
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    The first afternoon I was tied up in a meeting for a few hours – this was quite good as the hosts wanted me to have a few too many glasses of vodka with them and we ended up making good friends rather than much progress on the work we were doing – having spent some time with Vietnamese I realise that often one must come before the other. My friend regaled them with stories of me eating dog in Saigon and after that things really lightened up - it was Vietnamese vodka shots all round for a good hour at the end of the meeting .

    I have to go back to the island again soon so after the meeting I took some time to check out another hotel. I may take Mrs. Kerr and Wayne Jnr so was looking for somewhere good for Mrs. Kerr’s running and tennis. This was the joint I checked out. The rooms go for $US22 a night, brand new joint looking over the sea with aircon and a good breakfast menu – although I think we’ll be heading back to the beachfront bungalows at Kim Hoa.


    ^ New hotel on Phu Quoc Island


    ^ Nice pool once again


    ^ Different take on the pool


    ^ Good tennis court with a massage joint down the back

    After sussing this joint out we headed back to Kim Hoa Resort for some beer on the beach before hitting a local karoake joint. There are only two things that Vietnamese men love more than their local vodka and beer - massage joints and karaoke. We planned to leave the massage to the next night .


    ^ View of the roof of my bungalow looking down onto the beach


    ^ Bloody near impossible to find a spot on the beach to drink in the late afternoon


    ^ Even more people up that way


    ^ My bungalow was the one on the left
    Last edited by Wayne Kerr; 20-02-2007 at 08:34 PM. Reason: Wayne Kerr F-ed Up Again

  5. #30
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    Well I know where our next beach holiday is and it aint hua hin

    Is there a lot of places to eat at or only at the hotels?

  6. #31
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    Lots of places to eat, noodle stalls, little seafood joints on the beach, street side bread roll sellers etc. I will admit I pretty much only remember eating breakfast as lunches and dinners were mostly liquids. The breakfast at the Kim Hoa is great, can order as much as you want until full and it aint none of that buffet crap - Vietnamese bread, cheeses, noodles and stuff.

    Transport is okay too - the hotels run buses into the market and other places every half hour or so. I don't know if these rates on the rent-a-bikes are reasonable or not - never rented one.


    ^ Rates for renting a bike on Phu Quoc

  7. #32
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    Karaoke on Phu Quoc Island

    Karoake joints in Vietnam go off. I really think places like Soi Yodsak are lame in comparison. Plus the girls you find working in them are far more attractive than similar style karaoke places in Thailand. I work with quite a few Vietnamese and most agree that there are more attractive girls per capita in Thailand, but they are ALL of the strong opinion that good looking Vietnamese sheilas are far more attractive than the good looking Thai ones – I tend to agree with them, especially when it comes to after hours entertainment places. Jesus "one night in Phu Quoc ... ".

    Anyway first night on the island we planned a bit of singing. For those of you who have never frequented such a place, you are typically set up with 1-2 hotties that sing and are expected to get drunk with you, i.e., they drink from your glass and participate in any group “bottoms up” if you are singing at the time. You can also direct them to "bottoms up" with anyone at anytime and they'll do it. Most of them could drink your average Yank under the table, but as you can imagine they are usually quite small and end up getting a bit promiscuous later in the night .

    One of my Vietnamese colleagues and I agreed to share the cost of the night for 5 of us, which included beer and about 10 girls/hostesses. Anyway we drank about 4 crates of beer, just about all the guys disappeared with their birds for a bit, and we ended up paying a total of 700,000 baht (sorry Dong) (say US$45) for the night. I tipped the two girls looking after me US$5 just before we left and one of them dragged me into one of the private rooms and started getting her gear off – I was had it by this stage so did a runner .

    I know some of my friends back home reading this will think this all sounds a bit suss, but it is a pretty normal night out for southeast Asian blokes and it is pretty hard to work with them without getting involved. Lame excuse I know - shit why don’t I just say it is ALWAYS a shitload more feckin fun than dropping $50 on beer alone while trying to shag some fat, pimply arsed mole at the Woolloomooloo Hotel. Anyway, here’s a bit of video I salvaged that night - one of the hostesses got hold of my camera whilst I was singing and deleted all the good photos. She probably did me a favour as Mrs. Kerr is pretty good at sniffing this stuff out these days.


    Lame video clip of one of the girls showing me how good she could dance with the beer delivery man:
    Attached Files Attached Files
    Last edited by Wayne Kerr; 20-02-2007 at 10:50 PM.

  8. #33
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    700,000 baht (say US$45)

    I really hope that Dong (or whatever its called) as I'm not in the best of shapes as it is

    WK - I'm really enjoying this thread and it is making really fee like going. As a budget, how much would you say the round trip cost - couple of thousand US$?

  9. #34
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    Oops, sorry the beer is kicking in. Yep 700,000 Vietnamese Dong, not baht. I spent $US330 for my room (5 nights), beer, a few alcoholic dinners for 6+ people, plus about 3 massages. Airfare to Phu Quoc from Bangkok is about $300. So say $600. $1000 you'd wear the skin off it . I'm pretty sure it is cheaper to holiday on Phu Quoc than a beach in Thailand.

  10. #35
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    One of my friends said he just posted his videos from the Karaoke session on You Tube - might be a bit hard to search since he used some Vietnamese words as titles and stuff .
    Last edited by Wayne Kerr; 20-02-2007 at 11:01 PM.

  11. #36
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    ^cannot green you anymore - but I think I'll go alone

  12. #37

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    Oh Dear, now a word of warning here, with pictures you can download them and get the data of the make, model number and serial number of the camera, probably can do the same with the vids

  13. #38
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    Ya reckon ?

    Anyway back to the road …

    I was pretty lucky to wake up in the morning after that Karaoke night. Somehow getting on the turps by the beach is better for ones hangover than doing the same in bloody Bangkok. Anyway we were headed for the small island group to the south of Phu Quoc and as soon as I jumped on the boat my hangover was gone.


    ^ View after waking up on the front of my bungalow after the karaoke session


    ^ Southern island destination that day


    ^ Wayne Kerr’s ride to the south


    ^ Coastline near the port on the main island – taken not long after we set off


    ^ A view of some of the smaller islands not long after we left Phu Quoc Island proper


    ^ This is just a bit of a teaser – the beach in the background was where I was headed and this is the boat that came out to greet us.

  14. #39
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    Here's a quick clip taken when cruising to the southern islands .
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  15. #40
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    Visit to an Island Commune South of Phu Quoc Island, Vietnam

    The commune I was visiting depends almost entirely on fishing. So there was no shortage of boats when we arrived in town.


    ^ A fisherman’s shack out on the water – I’d love stay in one of these for a while with a small boat to explore the coast .


    ^ Another fisherman’s shack


    ^ Strange looking boat


    ^ More boats


    ^ Many of the boat people rarely come ashore and do most of their trading out on the water


    ^ This is the main entrance to the commune. They like to keep fires burning in the market areas to ward off the mozzies – plenty of nasty mosquito borne illness in the area. First sign you see is advertising mobile phone cards .


    ^ We were off to the local commune headquarters – not a bad looking shack .


    ^ After the meeting we went across the street to the restaurant for brunch


    ^ The commune hospital was next door – nearly had to check myself in to dry out a few hours later


    ^ The Vietnamese are great hosts and here is the lunch they had waiting for us – succulent crabs, steamed grouper, and squid. I had my eye out for the beer but unfortunately they didn’t have any – instead they had the fridge nearly full of the local rice wine in 1 litre jugs. I started getting worried about what was going to happen next .


    ^ Things started out quite innocently. The red jug contained the good old 45 degree rice wine – there must have been about 20 blokes, with me being the only westerner – of course everyone had to drink large shots of the wine with me. Not collectively – one by one. By the time we’d finished the crabs I’d had about 20 shots to everyone elses 1. In Vietnam a whole group will traditionally only drink from two communal glasses. This was just the start .


    ^ Then even the Vietnamese started getting pissed – one of my friends reckons by half way through the lunch I’d had about 40 glasses .


    ^ After all the wine the fish bladder and eyes started to look good


    ^ The restaurant owner who is also one of the commune leaders brought his daughters out to meet me a little later – they were back from University in Saigon for Tet (New Year celebrations). The one on the right is getting ready to graduate as a pharmacist, the one on the left has just started studying environmental science. Speak bloody good English compared to Thai Uni students.


    ^ We ended up stumbling back to the beach – some of the fishermen wanted to give us a guided tour of some of their favourite places around the island. A quick swim and some fishing were also planned. I was flat out just walking back to the beach. At one stage I remember needing a leak and was led into a dark boat engine workshop and told to piss down a really small hole in the ground. I stood there for several minutes drunkenly looking for the hole but could find it - a fisherman ended up leading me on a long walk through this maze of shanties to the commune pisser. It was the first time I can remember being so drunk that I contemplated pissing my pants.


    ^ Fishermen shacks


    ^ We were all so pissed that nearly tipped the small canoe over a few times on the way back to the boat


    ^ The fishermen on most of the boats where working pretty hard cleaning their nets by this stage – they got a good a laugh out of seeing a drunken westerner trying to haul his fat arse back onto the boat


    ^ A view of the beach when we were heading off to explore some remote parts of the islands
    Last edited by Wayne Kerr; 21-02-2007 at 08:42 PM.

  16. #41
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    This really is a great thread.

  17. #42
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    Wayne, what sort of business are you in? (apart from the drinking business)

  18. #43
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    Well you've sold me- I really have to visit this Island.
    Great TR.

  19. #44
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    This is a great thread.

    Wayne, I live in Saigon.

    I've never tried dog meat.

    Could you post or PM just the general location of where to eat dog in Saigon?

    I could ask someone else, but hardly anybody has tried it, therefore they don't know where places are (and where the good ones are).


    Cheers to this great thread. Nice pics, great info!
    ............

  20. #45
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    Quote Originally Posted by MeMock
    Wayne, what sort of business are you in? (apart from the drinking business)
    I’m a fish monger – not very exciting but I get to eat lots of seafood and drink lots of beer .

    Quote Originally Posted by Milkman
    Could you post or PM just the general location of where to eat dog in Saigon?
    Sure will Milky, will try to get a Vietnamese buddy to sketch a map and I'll post it up here .

    Been a bit slow getting the rest of the Phu Quoc pics in here. Got a surprise visit last week from my younger brother so I've been flat out keeping him out of too much trouble - jeez it would be great to be young, single and have a massive disposable income again.



    Apart from great memories of getting roaring drunk in way too many bars, a very late night in an infamous bondage bar, and a long day hunting for him around Pattaya after he got lost, all I've got to show for his visit is a freezer full of Australian lamb that he smuggled in and Robert Barretts latest book. I'd be happy to send the book onto any Les Norton fans out there.


    ^ Aussie lamb chops in Wayne Kerr's freezer



    ^ Robert Barretts latest book - I guess maybe only the Australians on here would be familiar with his stuff

  21. #46
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    Anyway, back to the road …

    After the long liquid lunch on the island we were off for a spot of fishing and a swim. It was early afternoon and the only thing biting was squid, so we decided to head off to a secluded bay for a quick swim to sober up. Here’s a few photos and a clip of a bit of video I took of one of the reefs.


    ^ Looking back at the commune


    ^ Not far offshore we bumped into some fishermen catching squid – we were going to join in but thought they probably needed the bloody things more than us and took off for a swim instead


    ^ Some of the small fishing boats off Phu Quoc Island


    ^ Apparently this bloke pretty much lives on his boat. He had his 2 kids on there helping him – they were both younger than 10.


    ^ Bigger boat with heaps of blokes catching the suckers


    ^ The secluded coral reef area we found for a swim


    ^ The water was so clear you could see the different types of corals from the boat – these reefs are very, very rarely dived on


    ^ Another pic of the secluded coral reef area we found off Phu Quoc Island


    ^ The beach looked absolutely awesome but we didn’t have enough time to go ashore and explore - next time hey!

    I put the camera away at this time and started screwing around with my mates video camera and a dodgy waterproof housing we had for it – here’s a clip of some video of the reef there .
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  22. #47
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    Once again, great thread. One question:

    First time I visited Vietnam was back in the 80's. We went down to Vung Tau to have a look at the beach. The thing that struck me was all the places along the main highway that rented bathing suits.

    Is that still going on or has the economy reached the point where people can afford their own?

  23. #48
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    ^ lol

    I think those days are well gone - I've managed to get there every few months for the past few years. Each time I go there I am amazed at how richer everyone seems to be getting. But as for the bathing suits - we just wore our underpants we were so pissed .

  24. #49

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    Quote Originally Posted by Wayne Kerr
    But as for the bathing suits - we just wore our underpants, we are Aussies .
    Class, real class

  25. #50
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    After the swim we headed back to the commune to drop some guys off and pick a few up who wanted to come back to Phu Quoc Island proper for a few drinks – it would be very, very easy to settle into island life in southern Vietnam. I could probably just about afford it too. Here’s a few pics of the trip back to port .


    ^ Long deserted beaches everywhere – here’s one which tickled my fancy


    ^ Another deserted Phu Quoc Island beach


    ^ A nice big boat anchored off the commune beach


    ^ I guess they get used to the smell of squid drying on the nets after a while


    ^ Picking up a young lass that was coming back to have dinner with us


    ^ Another fisherman’s hut out on the water


    ^ Leaving the commune – hopefully I’ll be back there soon


    ^ Arriving back at port


    ^ We were quickly rushed off to one of the locals homes for more drinking and sticky rice – it was just a few days before the Chinese New Year and apparently they like to fill any guests up with lots of sticky rice and vodka at this time – actually when I come to think of it things are pretty much the same as this all the time in Vietnam .


    ^ Then it was drinks by the pool before kicking onto the massage that the local fellows we were with recommend


    ^ This is the card for the best massage place on Phu Quoc. At 50,000 dong per massage (say 120 baht for 1hr), and given the fact that all the girls were super attractive and quite fun to joke around with, I deemed it necessary to have 3 separate massages – I was not disappointed .

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