Floating bazaar

“Can Tho has white rice and pure waterr
Whoever visits will not want to leave”
As this verse goes the southern delta region is known for charming its visitors. HF explores why: the floating markets.

The floating market is not only a center of agricultural trade in southwester Vietnam, but also a blossoming tourist destination. In the earl dawn hours the market is bustling, and as the sun rises high over floating market and row back towards rural gardens on the banks.

Can Tho, or the West Capital, is a major city southwester
Vietnam located alongside the Hau River, a immense sea lined with palm trees. While it is not known when Ca Tho was founded, as the saying goes, “The Hau Rive provides silt: Can Tho provinces s good place to settle down.” Can Tho is famous for many reason such as its cuisine, with specialties like Cu Xa stuffed pancake So Dien Cong cake, Da Ly fish hotpot, and La San sweetened porridge. The city also boats beautiful vistas, surrounded by streams, wide fields, and trees that beer fruit year-round. One of the city’s most important features is on water: the Can Tho and Hau River join at Ninh Kieu Harbor, which, along with the floating bazaars, has turned Can Tho into an epicenter of trade for regional provinces.

The history of floating markets is not documented in detail, as the bazaars have typically operated without official organization. Typical features of Southwest Vietnam, the markets exits on the river’s surface amid hundred of boats. Can Tho has numerous floating bazaars, including Cai Rang, Phong Dien, and Phung Hien. The location for a floating market must be convenient and safe; neither too shallow nor too deep. Both vendors and buyers maneuver in boat through the marketplace, which is open all day, through most crowded between dawn and 8 am. Boats are loaded with goods from different provinces, which are denoted on the side of the boat.

White Phong Dien floating market is 17 kilometers from the river onto the bank; other markets are closer such as Cai Rang. Cai Rang floating market is only five kilometers from Ninh Kieu Harbor and accessible by bus, taxi, motorcycle, private boat or, most conveniently, by tourist ships. Cai Rang is a wholesale market for agricultural products of the region.

Locals generally sell produce nearby, while owners of large ships distribute all over the region. Fruit fills the bellies of the boats, classified by freshness and size. At the bazaars, smaller boats. The river is full of noise: engines, rowing, laughter and talk. All sales are carried out happily and quickly, as vendors and buyers know each other and the prices well. It is a bustling, yet peaceful scene.

At floating bazaars, each boat advertises its product by hanging it in a rod; so that buyers can distinguish goods in a crowded market easily mango, orange or sugarcane. Sometimes what’s hanging on the rod is just a symbol of what is for sale: a palm leaf indicates that the boat itself is for sale. There are other items hanging on rods that are, of course, not for sale, such as drying laundry or pots and pans.

Getting hungry? Some boats hawk quick eats such as noodles, coffee, and sticky rice. There are even services available on the river: engine repair, gasoline, scale repair and pharmacies.
People hastily buy and sell, as boats navigate through the market. The river is gentle, as are the people. Mornings at Hau River are covered with mist, as boats run upstream and downstream into the harbor. The marketplace is ever-changing: deserted and then crowed, noisy and then still.

Come to Can Tho, just once, and visit the fabulous floating bazaars.