HCMC - day 2

 

we started the day early after breakfast at hotel.

from sofitel, it's only a short walk of 10-15m to the unification palace via the main le duan street.

 



motorbikes everywhere! huge roundabout with bikes and cars zooming from all directions and NO traffic lights!

I really don't know how we cross the roads most of the time

 

we decided to drop by Windows cafe which is one of the recommended cafes for HCMC.

not too bad given the ambience.

but the interior smell like the its turned into a KTV/pub with too much smoking and alcohol... @_@

the pho with beef balls was good but the rest of the dishes were so-so.

still, a good meal.

we opted for non-smoking section and were led to this secluded open-air corner. @@

but its a good thing for it was thumping bad techno in the café!

 

unification palace is just opposite windows café - we didn't go in but just take some shots of it.

opposite it are the city parks which are pretty small but the few times we walked past it the next evening, they were full of locals having drinks and looking relaxed, chatting.

a nice sanctuary in the city

 

 

next up, we walked over to the notre dame cathedral and post office which are incredibly near.

nice architect and i especially like the interior of the post office.

posing in front of the church

interior of post office - grand!

 

by then, it was almost 4pm and we were mostly drenched in sweat.. the weather was that atrocious.

we walked back to our hotel to laze the late afternoon away - shiok!

 

by 6+pm, we were good to go again.

we took a cab to district 2 for our dinner - la villa French restaurant.

read good reviews about this restaurant online and made reservations before the trip. the location is a little off but luckily by cab its only a mere 15m away from district 1 where our hotel is.

 

the décor, ambience and menu of the restaurant are fine dining standard.

the food was good too especially for the price ~ US$100+ for 4 of us.

but again, I rather pay abit more for the tastier food in bali. :P

hard not to compare when we just did bali only 3 months back and I can still remember clearly how fine the food was!

 

chanced upon this very nice desserts shop next to our restaurant

bought a red velvet cupcake and lemon tart for tea break tomorrow which turned out to be absolutely delicious!

 

and that concluded our 2nd day in HCMC!