Day 23 Hanoi.

So we eventually arrived safely in Hanoi, although it is 17 degrees and pouring with rain as the northern monsoon shows its hand a month early! It feels like the pilot took a wrong turn and we are back in good old blighty and not Hanoi.

Our business class taster flight was an enjoyable experience, albeit too short (I should have insisted on an upgrade to our flight home!). As would be expected there was oodles of legroom, elbow room and even 'bum room'. We were served a drink when we arrived in our seats (not champagne though) then the daintiest of sandwiches you could ever see. Three right angle triangle shaped open sandwiches, although the Earl of Sandwich would be most aggrieved to hear such small specimens being called sandwiches (for the geeks amongst us the hypotenuse was 2 inches, and the other two sides were equidistant so you can work out precisely the sandwich size). Each sandwich had a slice of meat/pate/prawn arranged with a dinky slice of cucumber/baby corn/gherkin finished with a sprig of mint/lettuce/slice of miniature lime - all orchestrated together with typical vietnamese military precision.

However, clearly we must have not looked like your normal business class passenger, appearing a little grubby to the hostess, as she kept delivering a succession of flannels (hot and cold) for us to rub down.

We landed safely and were met by our guide, Mr Long, who we had met on our first day, some three weeks ago. Again Mr Long apologised for our problems and offered us an upgrade (yet another!) on our boat trip in Halong bay in some 2 days. I can only speak highly of Selective Asia, not just for the experiences they have organised for us and the sheer professionalism of their guides, but especially for how they responded to a problem that they had no control over.

Today we are off on a city tour of Hanoi, and our guide has promised we will also have time for what I had intended doing yesterday afternoon, had we arrived on our scheduled flight. We also plan to visit the most exclusive restaurant in Hanoi tonight, after all it is called 'Le Tonkin'!!

First stop is the Temple of literature where the first university was founded in 1075 (beats Oxford) and where the name of every qualifying PhD student is inscribed on a stone tablet, mounted on the back of a stone turtle. I guess your tablet/turtle can be found somewhere in Leicester, Matt?

Then we move onto the mausoleum for Ho Chi Minh. We forgo the two hour queue to see his preserved body and settle for a tour of the grounds and the two houses he lived in during the war.

Next we move on to the Hanoi Hilton, the name given to the prison where american pilots were held, after being shot down and captured. Previously the prison was used by the French to hold insurgents prior to the war. Its difficult to truly judge conditions at this time, because of the propaganda, but certainly the insurgents had it worse than the Americans, and the american conditions look better than those at Guantamino bay.

Then we have a walking tour of the old town, including lunch at a streetfood cafe. We then had a cup of true vietnamese coffee. Now this was as strong as you could wish, so strong I was ready to give Julie (and our guide) a piggyback to our final destination for the afternoon.

They declined, so we each made our own way to a water puppet show. How to describe this? Well a choir/orchestra sing and narrate a number of stories (on dry land) whilst a number of puppets tell the story on a stage that is effectively a swimming pool. (Heaven knows how they did it).

The story was a little difficult to follow but ran along the lines of a man who like to sing in his pants in a field, but he is chased off by a man riding a water buffalo, so that some men can plant some rice, but the man comes back with his wife to chase some multicoloured ducks, one of which a cat steals and climbs a tree, then on come some dancing girls.....or perhaps by then I was hallucinating as the caffeine began to kick in!

Anyway we returned to our hotel to rest before our meal in Le Tonkin. A full review of which will appear tomorrow.

Comments:

Matt I feel truly aggrieved that my name has not been immortalised in turtle form. Grand national here and the boat race here today. Big game for Bristol City too- try not to lose sleep over it ;) xxxx

Apr 11, 2015

Andy Not losing any sleep, I'm following it here on BBC, OTIB and BCFC Twitter (hotel has provided laptop in room!).

Apr 11, 2015