Hanoi soon became one of our favourite places in Vietnam, and favourite cities of the trip. Perhaps it was the post-trip exhilaration, or maybe just the cheap and tasty beer, either way our 3 nights there went far too quickly, and we could have easily spent another few days doing what we did each day on repeat: delicious brunches in a café overlooking the gothic St Joseph's Cathedral, taking leisurely walks around Hoan Kiem lake, exploring the French Quarter, and stocking up on some Vietnamese art to take home. Hoan Kiem lake was a great place to capture the beating heart of the city, where Hanoians gather in the late afternoon sunshine to sit, gossip, or exercise, and is equally atmospheric at night with its central pagoda beautifully lit up. We also saw a rather curious ritual: betrothed and formally-dressed couples wandering around the lake with a photographerr, trying to pick the best location for their wedding photoshoot - we also witnessed the next stage on from this later on that evening, with brides in full wedding dress queuing up outside the famous Metropole Hotel for photos with their grooms.

We probably only skimmed the surface of Hanoi in 3 days, but what we saw we loved - it's a truly captivating city, full of Asian charm sitting alongside its historic colonial legacy. Our stay there happily coincided with our first wedding anniversary, which will always be memorable: we started the evening with a drink at the bar in said Metropole Hotel, a beautiful colonial gem of a hotel with a very interesting history, its walls having seen a fair share of turbulent times during French occupation and the Vietnam War, since its establishment in 1901. It has also seen a number of famous guests, from Graham Greene and Somerset Maugham to Roger Moore, and is also where Charlie Chaplin and his wife spent their honeymoon! Dinner afterwards was at a restaurant nearby, in a beautiful dining room of a former French Colonial townhouse, where we had probably the best meal I have ever had: a 7-course feast of gourmet delights, our favourite courses including vermicelli-wrapped scallops with apple and pear, steamed snowfish in soya sauce and ginger, and the trio of crème brulees for desert. All washed down with red wine of course. Food was a big highlight of our time in Vietnam, and this was the culmination of two weeks of eating so well. It was just amazing, and felt truly spoilt celebrating in such a beautiful setting and city. I think it is fair to say our first year of marriage will be difficult to beat!

We had to hot-foot it out of Hanoi and Vietnam the next day, having realized the day before that our Vietnam visa ran out a day earlier than we thought, so rather than travel by train to our next destination in China, we had to book an 'emergency' flight so that we weren't still on Vietnamese territory when our visa expired. So we had one day less in Hanoi than planned, but I am sure we will be back - Vietnam remains the top of the list of countries we would come back to in a shot. We absolutely loved our time there - mostly due to the wonderful road trip on the back of a motorbike - and while we didn't have time to stop and see a lot of Vietnam's main sights along the way, it's excellent to have an excuse to return.