My god this country is poor. Kindly. Gentle. But mainly poor. In one day I have walked the nation's capital ( as imposed by the French ). I have seen their 'arc de triomph', which mainly holds tourist tat stalls, I've seen the wonderful pagoda that is also their national icon, which is in dire need of a respray and surrounded by tat stalls, I've seen the national museum, which you would leave if it were your hotel room, seen the national stadium, which is small...

So we dash back on the bus from Ha Long to hump around Hanoi a bit to bring the formal tour to an end. We visit the Hanoi Hilton; the nickname given by the captured GI's to the central prison in Hanoi. Weirdly, only one wing has been preserved, and the rest of the site was sold off and built into a massive office block, hence the picture. Sue, one of our party, actually works for the prison service in the UK, and she regales us with descriptions of the holida...

So, the tour over, I still have a day to mooch around Hanoi before flying over to Vientiane, the capital of Laos. And I cannot capture how lucky that was. I got the time to visit Ho Chi Minh's mausoleum, which instantly became my favourite moment of the whole trip. Uncle Ho's tomb is such a draw that despite the late night the night before, we were in a cab to get over there by 8.30. And we were lucky we did. The queue went on for miles. Genuinely the queue w...

Ok, so this is where I should gush about the beauty of Halong Bay. We stayed out on a boat with lots of lively scenery, limestone caving and kayaking. I could mention the top storm or the origin of the place name. But I am burnt out. Holidaying for 7 weeks straight has burned me out. I need a holiday.

So, dearest reader, you may have been aware if a drift in quality in my blogging in recent days. I'm sorry. Partly this has been due to the exhaustion you feel at the end of another day's cycling. Partly because cycling douses your eyes with little joys that don't warrant an entry. Partly, I have been diverted by my fellow travellers. But the main culprit has been a newly refound dirty secret passion. The love of a woman. I've been reading Charlotte Bronte's J...