We arrived in Hanoi fresh faced after our super speedy one hour flight from Vientiane with Lao Airlines. Tom was more than a little concerned to be flying with this particularly airline particularly considering the questionable state of most of the transport in Lao. In his nightmares I think he was imagining some sort of airborne pedalo with a cheery Lao driver pumping his legs like mad but luckily the plane was immaculate if a little on the small side with only 76 passengers. Unfortunately this did not reassure him of its competence and he spent most of the flight studiously reading a book and pretending that we were anywhere other than on a plane.

As we stepped off the plane we got a bit of a shock as our t shirt and shorts clad bodies were not prepared for 15 degree cloudiness of northern Vietnam.We soon dug out the jumpers though and jumped on a minibus to the centre of town where we were shocked by the sheer number of motorbikes crowding the roads and furiously beeping their horns. The Vietnamese seriously love their motorbikes!By this time it was around 6pm so the evening was spent finding a satisfactory and cheap hotel and orienting ourselves within the city. Luckily by fluke the hotel we had found ourselves in was in a great part of town with loads of restaurants and within easy distance of the huge lake that dominates the city centre and makes a great landmark when you get hopelessly lost!

Our first day in Hanoi was spent visiting some tourist attractions, the Museum of Ethnology which documented the lives of the various tribal people of Vietnam and then the Hoa Lo Prison Museum which was within the prison building itself and focused on the imprisonment of Vietnamese in the prison during the French occupation and then the residency of American POW's during the American/Vietnam War. After being scammed for a double fare by a taxi driver on the way to the Ethnology Museum we were feeling righteous and decided to make the rather more challenging journey across town via local bus. After approximately 2 hours and various buses and a fair few odd looks from locals we finally managed it and all for a smidgen of the price we paid in the taxi. We were supremely proud of our adventurous spirits and also grateful to the school girls that had used the fabulously international language of mime to get us going in the right direction! I would like to say that we spent the evening celebrating such achievements but unfortunately after setting off for an area of bars in the town we got hopelessly lost and ended up wandering the city for two hours before eventually finding our way back and having a drink in the bar next to the hotel. It turns out the lake isn't so great of an orientation device if you can't find the lake!

Our third day in Vietnam and we set off on an organized tour to Halong Bay. It was a 3 hour bus ride to Halong City which is essentially a dumping ground for all the tourists heading for the bay and certainly not a picturesque location. Finally after the obligatory wait we got on the boat which was pretty nice considering the cheap price and lunch was all ready to be served as we set off out of the harbour. With these kind of group tours the main determiner of their success is the people that you are randomly assigned to be with and unfortunately ours wasn't as great as it could have been mainly because we were a fairly small group which included a large family of 8. However we did befriend two other English girls who improved the trip immensely. The trip included kayaking on the bay (at which I was poor and Tom decided he had a natural aptitude for!) visiting an enormous cave and looking at a floating fishing village. Unfortunately although the daytime activities were good there was zero effort put into the night time entertainment and the Vietnamese crew just took over the main area and watched TV whilst we sat out in the dark and looked longingly at the snazzy boat moored next to ours. Those passengers had clearly paid the premium price and the free wine was flowing as they blasted out karaoke. Finally by 11pm myself and Lottie had had enough and wanted some of the action so after making friends with the waiters through waving and laughing at them they beckoned us over and we decided to climb onto their boat and gatecrash the party! Luckily the remaining hardcore party passengers were excited to have some stowaways and when we rewarded them with an intense version of Britney's 'Ooops I did it again' with accompanying movements I believe from the adoring reception that they were even happier! Free drinks were in order and a few more songs including the classic 'Its's Raining Men' were performed before we made our exit and pulled the boats together again to enable us to climb back onto our rather more subdued boat.Back on our vessel we sat with the other younger passengers some Danish and Finnish couples up on the sun deck until late polishing off the beers.

The next morning it was an 8am breakfast before the boat began slowly moving back towards the harbour where we arrived at 11am and were forced to eat the lunch that was included even though 11am is definitely not lunchtime in my book! We were lucky with the weather as visibility was fairly good all the time out on the bay and we could appreciate the picturesque location whereas most people we have spoken to since were forced to postpone or cancel their trip due to the poor weather and rain. Then it was back on the bus to Hanoi where after a quick meal we were back on yet another bus but this time with 'beds' on it for the 14 hour overnight trip to Hue in central Vietnam.