Vung Tau, November 2006

Vung Tau is a resort area by the sea. I found this sign in the hotel room amusing.	Here is the hotel pool. Unfortuantley, we came here on our last day and none of us felt like dragging wet, sandy bathing suits back on the plane. There was no time when we'd be able to let them dry.	It was low tide and early when I went out to take these pictures.	Many people were out in the water collecting clams and fishing.
Some ladies were in the water and wanted me to take their picture. It was real hard to see them because the sun was right in my eyes (which is why all these pictures are so terrible). It was hard to see but they looked like they might have been buddhist monks.	Another view down the beach, I like the way the water looks in this one.	Some puddles on the beach. The beach was actually very clean with very little trash on it or in the water.	A couple of men pulling in fish nets.
A close up of them pulling in their nets.	Another picture of the beach.	A person fishing from a boat.	Tiny shells and critters on the beach.
A picture of a really small crab. He's toward the center of the picture. He was a little smaller than the nail on my little finger.	Another tiny crab, he might be a little easier to see than the last one, they moved fast and dug into the sand to hide, so these were the best shots I could get.	There was a giant Jesus statue on a cliff overlooking the sea. This is the statue from far away.	Here is a closer look of the statue. This was as close as we got to it.
The "white palace" was a resort for the French govenor when France occupied Vietnam. It was later used as a vacation home for the Saigon president until 1975.	A wedding couple who was doing a photoshoot at the white palace. Many Vietnamese couples come here to do their wedding photos and like other Asian countries brides will often wear 5 different dresses for these photos.	Mosaic tiles under a window.	A closeup of the tiles.
A description about the white palace.	Some ornamantation on the building.	A small garden overlooking the water.	More decorations run along the top of the house.
A cannon sits now as decoration.	A view of the water from the garden.	More tile work. The house had lots of neat floor tiles and mosaic work.	more tile designs.
A view of the water from a big window inside the house.	More floor tiles.	Another nice set of tiles.	Another wedding couple was taking pictures here as well. The groom poses on a Vespa. His wife, who was behind us, looked tired and uncomfortable in her dress. So, I didn't want to add to her angst by having a strange foreigner take her photo.
A set of stone stairs leading down the hillside away from the house.	One last view of the house.	We saw a huge statue of Mary off in the distance too. Unfortunately, this is the best picture I could get.	Some goats were crossing by our van.
Fish laid out near the edge of the road to dry. I would think they would get dirty from all the passing vehicles.	Cows crossing the road. We actually saw quite a few cows in Vietnam tied up in all kinds of places, like wide islands in the middle of the highway.	We saw a Buddhist shrine in Vung Tau as well.	Here is the large Buddha statue. It looks like they have their major religions covered.
A statue of the famous general Tran Quoc Tuan who helped his king defeat Ghengis Kahn. They drove giant wood stakes into the water to break up their boats. He is often seen pointing down toward the river.	They also had a whale temple to bring good luck and safety to sailors.	The temple had some neat paintings in it.	Another painting in the temple.
A painting showing two dragon shaped fish.	Here is the temple interior, which I thought looked... well, we'll just say it wasn't my thing.	One of the decorations up close.	The temple had large whale bones in a big glass case on display illuminated by redish-orange lights.
More whale bones.	One last view of the whale bones.	Here is my last picture of Vung Tau, we were waiting to ride the hydrofoil back to Saigon. I slept through that whole ride, not that there was anything to see.