This was a full day in Hanoi. For those on the tour who are leaving tomorrow, it was too short. We will be back in Hanoi twice more so we can do some additional touring.Our first visit was to the Ho Chi Minh Memorial. This is a mausoleum of the same nature as Lenin's in Moscow and Mao Tse Tung's in Beijing. His mummified remains are quite lifelike. We also visited the grounds of the Presidential Palace and the spartan home where HCM lived most of his life while in power in Vietnam. Lastly, we visited the Hanoi Hilton which is an old school the French converted into a prison. Many US pilots served out the last months or days of their lives here.

Like Saigon, Hanoi is a crowded and frenetic city, but it seems cleaner and more organized than Saigon. There certainly was bombing by the US during the Vietnam War, but the vast majority of temples, etc. escaped and evidence of the French tradion is everywhere, particularly in the cities.