Jill and I spent the April holidays doing a tri-city trip across Vietnam and Cambodia. Our first stop was Ho Chi Minh City, where we stayed for 2 days and 3 Nights (we arrived midnight April 3).
I haven't been able to finish the full blog, so here's short post on notable things that you should know when going to Ho Chi Minh. Some of these I read from blogs before going to the trip and some I learned as we were there.
Time
Money
I haven't been able to finish the full blog, so here's short post on notable things that you should know when going to Ho Chi Minh. Some of these I read from blogs before going to the trip and some I learned as we were there.
Time
- The plane ride takes about 2.5 hours.
- Vietnam is 1 hour behind the Philippines.
- Take note of your plane's arrival time esp. when coming back to Manila
- The Vietnamese currency is Dong (VND).
- Bring US Dollars (USD).
- I didn't notice any Peso rate for currency exchange so it's safer to have a stash of dollars. Also, USDs are more useful in Cambodia compared to other currencies, such as Euro.
- You can buy USDs from banks or money changers such as Sanry's. Just check which one offers the most favorable rate.
- Some bank needs you to pre-order dollars for exchange, which might take a week to be ready.
- You can exchange USDs for VNDs at the airport or hotel.
- Unless you carried an obscene amount of dollars, trying to find the best rate might not be worth it.
- Rate of exchange would be 1 USD = 21,000 VND
- The rate we got was: 1 USD = 21,549 VND
- The smallest Dong bill is 1,000 VND
- Quick trick for checking VND to PHP: 1,000 VND is approx. 2 PHP.