Me and my mates are headed down to the Philippines this June and possibly Vietnam, and I was wondering if anyone who’s been to these countries can offer up some tips, advice, stories, places to go (we haven’t yet decided which of the 7,000 Filipino islands to check out ;)) or anything like that. I’ve got more questions lined up but I’ll hold them till someone shows up here.
Thanks.
I haven’t been to the Philippines since the 70, but I went to Vietnam about 5 years ago. It’s a great place to visit.
I enjoyed Hanoi, Saigon, the central beaches and the northern hill areas. It’s good for scenery and recent history (the wars with the French, Japanese and Americans) but poor for ancient monuments. The museums are ok for ancient history, though. I liked the Army Museum in Hanoi, which has a truly spectacular statue of Buddha - as good as what you’ll see in Sarnath (India).
It’s easy enough to get around, although it is a long country and it can take a long time to get places. People are pretty friendly, English is quite widely spoken. Scams are about normal for poor countries with lots of tourists. There’s quite a lot of begging, often from disturbingly disfigured people. The traffic in the cities is alarming at first, but you get the rhythm of it quickly. The highways are genuinely dangerous. The infrastructure is poor and authority generally deeply - but not aggressively - corrupt.
The food is amazing - a riot of freshness, skill and pure flavours. I knew I was going to have a good time when I started walking around Hanoi’s thousand year old market and I could smell the fish market from a long way away and it smelled delicious. Great seafood, superb beef, great noodle soups, eleventy squillion varieties of spring rolls, huge plates of fresh salads everywhere. If you don’t fancy pho for breakfast, there’s excellent french-style bread. Local beer is good and cheap.