Wow, we were expecting a crazy city but this place is rediculous!!!

The place

Hanoi is the capitol of Vietnam, it has a population of around 3.5 million and they all seem to own a scooter and want to be in the same place at the same time.  It's buildings are a blend of vintage Vietnam and French architecture.  Every street is crazy, and you have to walk on the road as the shops and food stalls spill out onto the pavements.  Crossing the road took some getting used to.  You have to look both ways even on one way streets, walking slowly as the scooters, the odd bus and cars whizz by you.  If you stop you get nailed, we got used to it but it was scary as hell.  We spent most of the time in the old quater which has a lake called Haon Kiem (Lake of the restored sword).  There is a legend behind the name but it will take too long.

 What we did:

We spent lots of time just walking around the city taking in the sights and sounds. It took us a while to find a working cash machine, what a pain in the arse but we managed it.  We had got so hungry after the bus journey from Laos. There were so many resteraunts and bar's so obviously we checked a few out.  The food was cheap so we chose one overlooking the lake by a crazy roundabout.  Then it was time to head back to the hotel.

The next day we checked out the "Hanoi Hilton".  It was built by the French during their occupation of Vietnam.  The most part was showing the Viets as heros in the struggle for independance, it was a really terrible place to be.  Dummy's showed the conditions they had to endure, shackled in rows with not much room to move and unable to stand up, I couldn't have survived like that for long.  It also had a guilotene used by the french to execute their victims.  It went on to show how well the American POW's were treated by the Viets during the war, the Americans nicknamed it the Hanoi hilton.  It was a horrible place to visit but really interesting too.

 We went to the water puppet show, I thought it would be crap but agreed to go.  It all started hundreds of years ago by people in the rice paddies.  And now was on show for everybody to see.

Other places we went too were the Ho Chi Min morseleum, where uncle Ho was on show in a glass case surrounded by guards dressed in white.  It looked to me like he was on a sunbed, he looked good considering he has been dead for for nearly 30 years.  People bowed to him and we looked awkward not knowing what to do but were ushered on by one of the guards.  We went to the museum in the same complex, it showed how Ho Chi Min came to power and what he did for their country.  He seemed like a really genuine man from the photo's on display.  All in all it was a good day out.

It wasn't long before we had enough of this crazy city and head off on our next adventure.

The people we met:

Tressa and Michelle, well we already knew them from the bus journey, we spent a bit of time with them and met their two Irish friends.  So it was me, Jodie and four Irish women all heading out to a couple of bars.

Guesthouse woman, who's name I forget.  She got on the bus and told us she would give us a free taxi and could get a room elsewhere if she didn't have a room we liked.  We stayed in her hotel and she was really helpful getting us taxi's, giving us advice on where to go and tips on prices we should pay for stuff too.

 All in all we had a good time in Hanoi but it was somewhere that was too busy and the hassle from motorbike and cyclo drivers got a bit much.  We saw a minor accident where 3 lads got knocked off their scooter, they were ok, and a minor bump. How we didn't see more is beyond me as it was too crazy.