First time in Macau and Vietnam

After Singapore we spent two nights in Macau which is famous for its casinos. There are many same casinos as in Vegas like Wynn, MGM Grand etc and architecture is even more massive. We stayed in luxurious Sofitel hotel and walked around the casinos hitting penny slots and trying to uppgrade our budget without success ;). There was also a finnish sauna in our hotel, it was nice surprise :)
There are direct ferries between Hongkong international airport and Macau so you don't need to go Hongkong at all. We could even check our bags at the Macau ferry pier.

Shiny discoball in the front of our hotel's casino 

Deja vu (looks exactly the same as Wynn in Vegas.)

We stayed in Bangkok three nights and then flew to Ho Chi Minh City (ex Saigon) to Vietnam where we met our friends Hannu & Hansu from Finland. We stayed two nights in HCM-city and then flew to Phu Quoc island.

Hannu & Hansu 

Greetings from Finland!

Propaganda in finnish at the War museum.

Buying peeled pomelos

In Phu Quoc island we stayed in the Beach club which is nice hotel right on the beach. Phu Quoc is guite a small island and there is not much to do but it's nice place to relax.
We went scuba diving for two dives but visibility was poor (1-3m) so we didn't do it again.
We also rented a taxi in couple of days (it was cheap, less than 30 eur / 8 hours) and drove around the island. There are a couple of nice beaches, waterfall (without water ;)), pepper and pearl farm and jungle trek you can check out.

Traditional vietnamese coffee with milk.

Sun set at Phu Quoc

The view from our room door.

Boat.

Hot pots are good.

Happy couple on the beach.

Some small snack ;)

Pearl farm

Pepper farm

Pepper farm

 We were one week in the island and then went back to HCM-city.
It's very busy, big city. Traffic is more or less chaos, there is a lot of motorbikes everywhere. Crossing the streets are surprisingly easy though. You just walk slow and steady and the mopeds and cars will usually steer behind you. Don't bother waiting for a gap in the traffic. You would be waiting for the rest of your vacation...

Vietnamese delicates

Olli and Hannu got new friends who wanted to practice their english.

There are a lot of motorbikes in Ho Chi Minh City.

Vietnam is a lot less touristy than Thailand. Basic tourist things like postcards might be impossible to find and english wasn't spoken much (except for "yes"). The Phu Quoc island is probably getting more developed but at the moment there isn't much for tourist at least on the activity side. Right now it's best for beach vacation and simply relaxing and taking it easy.

Thanks Hannu & Hansu one more time, it was nice to see you!
Also thanks Hansu for sharing pictures.

-Maija

PS. Now we are already back in Thailand, in Phuket where we will meet Olli's friend and ex-colleague and after that we are going to Similan islands for world class scuba diving :)