US Consulate grounds

Barbecue Garden

Barbecue Garden is a downtown eatery that is exactly how it sounds - every table has a barbecue and its outside in a garden. Not a bad way to enjoy an evening meal

Notre Dame Cathedral

The city's most prominent christian church can still be easily spotted even as the sky starts to fill with larger buildings. I am impressed that both the church and the park are still visible from the west through the new Asiana Plaza

Mostly tall ships for sale

I really like the randomness of some shops here. This store is basically stocked with miniature tall ships, some even in bottles and little ones in light globes. But then they also sell caps made out of pepsi and coke cans, clocks and toy helicopters. How can you resist?

No storm last night

Kumho Asiana Plaza

The recently completed Asiana Plaza has not officially opened but last night it was all ablaze as furniture and office equipment was being moved in.

Downtown construction

There is a lot of construction happening all over Saigon at the moment, for a more detailed look go here. The city seems in an incredible rush to modernise and I cannot help wondering how well planned the new Saigon will be. There is a real lack of green space within the city and sites like the very large hospital grounds in the foreground must be kept at bay from developers. Time will tell I guess

Almond fingers

One of my favourite desserts here are almond fingers at Warda. Can never get enough

Ice men

Bridge lighting

This new bridge over the Saigon river has just installed relatively impressive lighting underneath that changes colours every 10 seconds or so. I usually would not have a problem with this except that HCMC suffers from poor electricity supply and pointless lighting (as opposed to necessary street lighting) I find, um, pointless. I did not realise it at the time, but while traveling on a one-way street, the sign is also facing the wrong way. While this may seem strange to international visitors, with so many motorbikes driving the wrong way down one-way streets it might actually have some impact.

Crane anchors

Vietnam National Day

It was National Day yesterday and the streets all around HCMC were decorated with banners of the national flag and the hammer and sickle. The streets become a sea of red on such holidays

Hauling rubble

September Theme Day - Big

I fly out of HCMC a lot at dawn, and occasionally we swing by the delta where the Saigon and Dong Nai rivers meet. The delta is quite large and is famous for its mangrove forests near the oceans edge, while inland the network of canals is used to navigate around the rice paddies. From the sky all you can really see is water everywhere. I always find it an impressive sight

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Dam Sen Cultural Park

Out in District 11, the Dam Sen Cultural Park creates a sea of the green. There are a whole heap of attractions throughout the park but the highlight for most on a hot and humid day is the water park in the foreground.

Empty bottle

The abandoned Van Thanh market

On a prime piece of real estate on Dien Bien Phu st Van Thanh market sits unused. I love the 60s architecture and cannot wonder why it remains in a state of disrepair and dereliction. Anyone know? I would assume developers would be itching to get their hands on the site.

Shops and housing on Điện Biên Phủ st

The majority of housing with street frontage will have some sort of retail shop on the ground level and living space on the floors above. This is a pretty standard representation except all of these houses are quite old

A bend in a river somewhere

These type of pictures portray rural Vietnam to be quite idyllic. I guess you would need to spend some time on the ground to make a proper judgment of just how tranquil the farming life would be.

Overloaded cyclo

Railway crossing

The Reunification Express, the Hanoi to HCMC line, has a number of street crossings on its way to Saigon station. It is not a bad way to see the countryside, however it is a pretty slow journey.

Marble headstones

Huế citadel

The square ancient citadel of the central coast city of Huế is clearly visible from an airplane window. As is the internal forbidden city (square green area near river). The citadel is now registered as a UNESCO world heritage site and rehabilitation works have been underway to restore it back to its former glory.

The Putzmeister

It is a little bit juvenile to laugh at this, but there used to be a guy at more previous employ who was called the Putzmeister - basically because he was a putz. I cannot believe there is a company producing concrete pumps with the same name

Beach, sand dunes and lagoon

A standard sight in central Vietnam are long straight stretches of beach with large lagoons behind them protected by sand dunes. The lagoons behind are a mix of fresh and salt water and are important habitats for local communities in fish and shrimp farming, as well as environmental conservation if managed properly. While the two great deltas are the source of most climate change discussion and funding, these areas in central Vietnam are also at high risk to rising sea levels, drought and natural disasters. As with most of Vietnam, I am looking forward to watching what happens in these areas in the future