We arrived at our hostel at 4 in the morning from our sleeper bus, we grabbed our stuff and just fell asleep in the lobby of the hostel on some sofas. We were up and about again by 8 and decided to take a chilled day and explore the city a little. We went and looked around Ho Hoan Kiem lake near the old district of the city. It was a pretty cool place with good views across and old 12th century buildings built on islands in the lake. The lake is pretty special in Hanoi as myth surrounds a giant turtle that lives there. Apparently a great warrior had a sword presented to him by a turtle in the lake to battle invading Mongolians. The Vietnamese hero won the battle and went back to the lake to give thanks, when a giant gold tortoise rose up and took the sword back, returning it back to the depths of the lake. There is actually a giant 2m turtle that is/was living in the lake. It was last seen in 2011 when it was captured and examined. It is a huge soft shelled species that is very likely one of the last of its kind, thought to be about 80-100 years old. So there is a little substance to the myth, but it certainly isn't gold. After the lake we went and looked around an old prison from the French occupation and war in Vietnam. It was used to hold political prisoners, and then later on as a POW camp for downed airmen in the American war. It was interesting but quite obviously very bias and it lost its historical appeal somewhat after the obvious bias it showed. The rest of the day we spent on admin, booking taxi for the airport, organising the hostel in Ho Chi Min and finally trying to get this blog up to date.