In case you missed it, you can find the first part of this Ho Chi Minh 3D2N Itinerary here.

After a full day exploring District 1, the inner city of Ho Chi Minh City, we went for a day trip out of the city to Mekong Delta River area. The day trip was very memorable, it was one of the highlights of our whole trip and I would highly recommend anyone visiting HCMC to visit.

Mekong Delta River Day Trip from Ho Chi Minh City

My local friend helped us organise our Mekong Delta River day trip tour from Ho Chi Minh City. Since he had a car, we opted for a private tour without transportation included that day. We left our hotel at around 7am and after picking up our guide, whose name happens to be Jennifer too, we started heading out of the city.

The journey from Ho Chi Minh City to the Mekong Rest Stop took about 1.5 hours. The Mekong Rest Stop is not a normal rest stop, it is actually a restaurant with a beautiful garden. Here we enjoyed a nice warm bowl of Vietnamese noodles for breakfast before the actual start of the tour.

The whole boat to ourselves! Yay to private tours!

From Mekong Rest Stop, we continued the drive for around 15-20 minutes to the river pier and boarded our very own, private motorboat for the day. The boat first took us around the delta area and we saw many floating fishing villages and other nice sceneries on the ride.

Interesting Experiences on our Mekong Delta River Day Trip

The boat ride then ended at Thoi Son (Unicorn Island) where the interesting (and exciting) part of the day begins. Upon our arrival, we were greeted by a local carrying a panel of honey bees. The bees were local to the area and we were challenged to extract some honey from the honeycombs using our bare hands. We were freaking out but our guide assured us that the bees won’t sting and we did it!

After the first unusual experience of the day, we were brought inside to have some of the snacks and honey tea. If you would like to bring some honey home, you can also do so here.

Right after we left the honey stop, we met a local who was carrying his pet snake and offered us to carry it – another freaky experience for me.

Anyway, our guide brought us to the next stop, a small coconut candy factory on the island. We saw how the local candy was made by hand and got to try some too! Again, there was a small store selling various coconut products if you want to buy some souvenirs.

There was also a small market connecting the points of interests on Unicorn Island. The stores sold various items from apparel and accessories to street food and tropical fruits.

Homemade local liqueur that they believe can make men “strong”

Private performance for us!

After having some of the island’s street food, we went on to the last stop on Unicorn Island where they showed us a bottle of the expensive local homemade liqueur with a whole scorpion and small snake fermented inside. I wouldn’t want to try even if they gave it to me haha! We were also given various tropical fruits to try including mango, pineapple and longan. They were all very sweet and refreshing.

To get back to the pier where our motorboat was docked, we took a sampan ride through a small river running through the island. This was a very common means of transportation around the island and it was a nice way to end our tour around Unicorn Island.

Our Mekong Delta River day trip then continued on another island where we tried hand-fishing.

We were given a set of local farmers’ clothing, called the Ao Ba Ba and a set of fish catching tools.

We then climbed down into the muddy creek to try and catch some fish. They farmers helped us out by draining out some of the water and we managed to catch 3 fishes! It was quite hard to walk around in the muddy creek and we came out covered in mud but the experience was definitely unforgettable. Thankfully there were small shower booths for us to wash up after the activity.

By the way, even after all these wonderful activities, it was still 12.30pm! It’s crazy how much we managed to see and do on this day trip.

Little did we know, the fishes we caught were actually part of our lunch menu. They cleaned the fish and brought us to this nice traditional Vietnamese restaurant where we had a really hearty meal.

Vinh Trang Pagoda, My Tho City

Our last stop for the Mekong Delta River day trip was a huge pagoda area.

Everything was intricately designed and the garden was well maintained (some parts were still undergoing maintenance too). Unfortunately, it was a very warm day so we ended up taking a few shots and then decided to hide in the pagoda’s cafe area before heading back to HCMC.

Mekong Delta River Tour Contact Details

We paid ~50 USD per person for this private tour. Everything except for the transportation was included in our package and I would say it was worth it! If you are interested to join a Mekong Delta River tour from HCMC, you can contact our private guide, Jennifer Huynh (htcbinh205@gmail.com) for more details. Transportation can also be arranged for you if you do not have a car during your trip.