Thrashing Tommy (our tour guide, whose actual name was Luongtrong Pham) was my last act on Monkey Island before our boat came to collect us.

The boat's roof top was glorious on the way back. The sun bashfully decided to raise its head and a shisha pipe was brought out. The image of a shisha pipe looks pretty intimidating, like a bong that's been made to look pretty with a colourful hose attached. We had some watermelon infused tobacco and puffed it between us as we all had a good chin wag and drank the remainder of Basil's beers. Shisha wasn't as fantastic as the boys that brought it made out, it would be a nice novelty to bamboozle dinner guests with but other than that I wouldn't recommend it.

The drive back to Hanoi consisted of strawberry cornettos, downloaded films and passed at a snail's pace.

Tremendously boring as the drive back to Hanoi was, there was a happy ending. We met up again with James and Polly from Sapa, at 'Chops'. As it happens Chops is a stunning burger bar that saw us all heartily fed and filled up. I opted for some gravy and mash as a side order, I didn't realise how much I'd missed the humble potato and some flavoursome gravy!