After a bad night's sleep in the boiling room we got up at 10ish and headed to a place next door for breakfast. I had toast and jam but it didn't come with butter so I asked for little bit. I didn't realise until we got the bill that they had charged me 10,000 dong for it! I had chosen toast because it was only 20,000 dong so to have half added on again was really frustrating.

We then headed to the Reunification Palace which was 30,000 dong to get in. We tried to get student prices but you have to be Vietnamese (racial discrimination is not considered to be rude here).

The palace wasn't very palatial because it was built in the 1960's. It has been left exactly how it was on the day in 1975 when the palace was stormed by the communists. It was quite interesting to see all of the meeting rooms and the basement bomb shelters covered in maps. There was even a cinema with soundproof walls and the projection room was amazing with humongous old fashioned projectors.

Afterwards we were wandering around the grounds and stopped on a bench next to a game of tennis so Vix could write some postcards. The people playing tennis started to talk to us - they are all doctors from the local hospital. There was a paediatrician, a two neurosurgeons and an anaesthetist! We had read in the guidebook that tennis is usually only played by the rich Asians so it made sense! They asked us to join in; I was worried I'd make a fool of myself, but Vix played with them for a bit. It was really surreal casually spending an afternoon by the tennis courts with some doctors. Vicky and I were talking to a 12 year old boy who was showing us his yoyo tricks - he knew the ones I used to do during the yoyo craze in the late nineties!

Afterwards we strolled along the road to see the Notre Dame cathedral, which was really nice and made of red brick. Next to it was the post office where Vix got some stamps, it is a huge French colonial building which was a tourist attraction in it's own right.

It was 4pm by this time so we headed back to a cafe on the same road as our guesthouse called Sozo. All the staff are disadvantaged Vietnamese people who are trained to bake and taught English so that they can work in the cafe. I had a strawberry and banana fruit shake and a tasty lemon zest cake. We sat outside on a balcony for a bit to enjoy the last of the sun, then headed back to get ready for the evening.

We ate at a restaurant on our road, and I chose a vegetarian green curry which was too spicy for me so I only managed half of it. We decided to go for a few drinks afterwards as they were only $1 in a lot of places. We also went to a bar which was buy two get one free on cocktails so we had one there. We went for one more drink at a bar near our guesthouse and ended up chatting to two Norwegian guys and one Finnish guy until gone 2am! The Finnish guy was 42, divorced and had just received a good redundancy package from Pepsico, who he used to work for, so he bought all of the drinks. They were telling us how expensive Scandinavia is - a pizza and a beer in Norway will set you back about £30!

At the end of the night, the Finnish guy bought me a nightcap of whiskey, which I didn't want but drank to be polite! Vix had gone back earlier but Vicky and I headed back sometime after 2am.

When I got back I went into the unoccupied room next to ours and called Ed and my parents, and didn't end up going to sleep until 4am! I wanted to charge my phone but the plugs in our room were being used, so I slept in the other room so I could charge my phone. Probably shouldn't have done but they did leave it open!