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  Hanoi, Vietnam
Tuesday, April 11, 2006

10/04
Arrived in Hanoi after a couple of Air Asia flights. A taxi from our guesthouse met us at the airport, which was great. Iy was a reasonably long trip into the old quarter of Hanoi and the streets were crazy. We didn't realise that people drive on the righ-hand side of the road, so that was a big surprise! I really can see why it's hazardous to cross the road here. Our guesthouse is great (Hanoi Guesthouse at 14 Bat Su Street, and excellent value for the price (NZ$12!) and includes breakfast. We meet Ha, he's a Vietnamese man about our age and very helpful. We chat to him about tours and decide to see the Perfume Pergoda tomorrow and get information on a cruise in Halong bay for the next day. We pretty much settle down in our room and have an early night once we've got our tour sorted.

11/04
Perfume pergoda today, up early for breakfast at 7:15. Breakfast consists of a small loaf of bread (French influence here) plus jam and cheese or butter. Coffee in a glass with whitener and lots of sugar. We learn that Vietnamese coffee seems to come like this as the default, it tastes good though I'm sure we don't need the sugar. A minibus (Ford transit van with Air Con) picks us up around 8am and we take a ride to the river that leads to the Perfume Pergoda area. The ride is crazy with much beeping and swerving all over the road to avoid traffic in the same and different direction, as well as cows and people. At one point we have a slight collision with another vehicle and our wing mirror is ripped almost entirely off! We pass many many Paddy fields on the way, plus pens full of ducks and other fields of varying vegetables. We jump in a narrow metal boat next, our captain/rower is a lady who seems to have a very unorthodox rowing style. Though we will soon learn this style is the norm in Vietnam and used widely. The trip in the boat takes an hour and a half and isn't exactly comfy by extremely scenic. Along the sides of the river are paddy fields and fishermen in even smaller boats than ours. The sun is pretty hot by this stage and it is almost 11AM. We arrive a a harbour that is lined with small makeshift shops made from bamboo and roofing iron. All the shops seem to sell the same things though there are a few 'restaurants' mixed in. They are not really our style of eating establishment and I'm sure eating there would be both interesting and potentially hazardous. We continue on up the hill to our left and reach a small plateau with a slighter better restaurant than we have seen and a few more larger shops (still very makeshift). Our guide tells us the restaurant is where we will be having lunch. There is a gondola, a real one - not makeshift, that leads up to the main pergoda. Due to the heat and a number of other factors including our shoes, the steepness of the path and time restraints we decide to catch the gondola up and walk down. The ride up is quick but once again scenic. The pergoda isn't really much to write home about but is very important to the Vietnamese and buddist followers must make a pilgrimage to the pergoda at least once in their life, or so I've been told. There are many legends associated with the pergoda and the surrounding area. Unfortunately our guide's English is about as good as a retarded squirrel so we have trouble understanding them. We make our way back down the hill, which turns out to be a real mission. The millions or people before us have rounded the large rocks that make up the path, to the point where they are smooth and slippery! We have to take great care not to fall. Add to the mix the shops that just seem to repeat o, people accosting us as we walk, the aural assult from Vietnamese DVD's playing (they were'nt good), the heat and we had a hard wlk down the hill. We get down to the plateau in time for lunch. Lunch is average, and as we will discover typical of Vietnamese food. Most meals seem to consist of several vegetable dishes and several meat dishes. The vege dishes are commonly garlic flavour beans, cabbage and maybe another mixed vege dish. The meat dishes usually consist of pork or beef and veges, seafood is very popular too and seems to be done quite simply. The others in our tour group are equally as worried as us about the prospect of getting a dog dish. The tour guide assures us that the dishes are not dog, though he also tells us one is beef when it is obviously pork... We avoid the the meat. After lunch we check out another nearby pergoda and the guide tells us about the legends behind the pergoda. Once again he is hard to understand and at one point he asks me a question to clarify I understand but I think he is talking about something completely different and give him a random answer. The guide looks at me like Im mental and says no, I'm wrong and continues on with the retarded squirrel routine. The boat ride back to the small harbour is just as scenic but at the end the boat rower wont let us off until we tip her 10,000 Dong each (NZ$1). This annoys me significantly because weve already paid for the tour and tipping isnt common in Vietnam. The ride back to the hotel is just as hectic as the ride in the morning but we are back safely before dinner time. We manage to find a pizza place for dinner and have a pretty tasty and safe meal.

12/04
Today the plan is to cruise into Halong Bay and then stay on the boat. After another early start and a long 3.5 hour ride to Halong Bay pier we board our Huong Hai junk boat. We are with a young Dutch couple, a middle aged American man, three young french guys and a Vietnamese couple. We get along with the American guy and the Dutch people quite well and end up eating with them for our meals and chatting to then a fair bit. We start by cruising on our boat out into Halong Bay. The boat is quite nice and we have our own double room and ensuite. The room is the width of the boat and has a fan as well as air-conditioning. Our boat is one of the better ones available though there are others that are much nicer, and cost just about twice as much. Our three day trip including all expenses (bar drinks) is less than US$100 each which is reasonable. We have a sunbathing deck, a common room/eating area/bar area plus another level with the majority of the accomodation. We have lunch after being on the boat for around an hour. At first I thought we were going to go hungrey for the trip but soon more food arrives and it is clear that we are not going to get any thinner on the cruise! The dishes are better than the previous day and there are many of them! After lunch we all do a bit more sunbathing on the roof, the day is sunny and its great on the top deck in our sun loungers. Next stop is the surprising cave which is surprisingly large. There are legends associated with the cave but they are very convoluted and not really worth repeating (the versions we understand anyway.) After be surprised in the cave we take a swim, we're allowed to jump off the top deck which is a good 5/6 metres and just about everyone does. Trudie wants to jump too and manages to jump off the next deck down at a height of 2/3 metres. We cruise for a little while more, have a meal and a couple drinks. The day is still warm and we lay around reading on the top deck until its to dark and then retire to bed. We both sleep well.

13/04
This morning we're up early, as has been the trend over the past couple days. We have a french style breakfast and then we're off canoeing. The place we pick the canoes up from is a fishing village and the floating house next to the school has our canoes. Some of the boats carried the canoes on board but we just called past and picked ours up. They are all double canoes, so of course Trudie and I share. We paddle through a few natural rock tunnels and into 'suprising bay'. It seems to us that there are a few suprising things here! Some people gofor a swim in the bay that is only accessible via the small tunnel, we don't. The weather isn't so warm today and only gets up to about 24'C. After a long paddle back we're on the boat again and then transferred to another for the trip to Cat Ba island. Only Trudie, Tom and me are doing the 3-day trip so the others continue back to the Halong Bay pier. There is one stop before we get to Cat Ba, Monkey Island. We are told there are 15 monkeys on Monkey Island and there is also a monkey keeper to feed them. Seems strange to us, monkeys usually look after themselves! We decide to not leave the boat as it isn't very warm and continue straight to Cat Ba. The ride takes us roughly 45 minutes. We don't seem to have a vehicle to take us to the hotel so we end up on the back of scooters. It's a quick 10 minute ride to the Prince hotel, though they spell it PrinceF or on some of the signs PrinceS. So, we are a little confused. Initally we get a room with two single beds, we ask for another but am told that ours has a great view. We decide since it's go such a good view we'll just push the singles together. Only problem is when we get to the room the view out the window is a brick wall about 10cm away, some view. I pop down and swap to another room with a double bed, incidentally the view from here is better. When I say better I mean the brick wall is 30cm away! We settle in and decide that Cat Ba doesn't look very exciting so we won't stay any longer than the tour. Initially we were going to stay longer in Halong Bay or Cat Ba. Internet is the next mission and we find some around the corner. The computers aren't flash and there are Vietnamese kids beside us playing games though we get the email checked. Trudie has a job offer and we spend the next hour or two trying to get a phone sorted to receive a call on. At 7PM we go out with Tom and La (tour guide) for the evening meal as part of the tour. The meal is average Vietnamese food. We go home after this and watch a movie on the hotel TV, not much else to do here.

14/04
The boat ride is back from the island uneventful. The bus part of the trip is slow and uncomfy. We're soon back in Hanoi at the Hanoi guesthouse (at NZ$14 per night including breakfast!) We don't know about Vietnam. It is very weird, soooo many people and the roads are chaos! Total chaos, we thought that we'd seem chaos in Thailand or Malaysia but this it. The traffic is so thick sometimes and some roads don't even have markings. The scooters can be up to 10 across and it's like a sea, at the intersections no one gives way. So you have streets full of scooters and the odd car practically runninginto each other and then swerving at the last minute to avid each other. Crossing the road is hazardous too, no one stops so that you just have to make a run for it. The most important part of a vehicle is the horn and they are used to death, we'reso sick of horns. Some people don't let up, tooting almost continuously! To make it worse, some of the scooters have bigger horns fitted that willalmost deafen you! They do eat dog here, as well as cat, maggots, bugs and pretty much anything else that moves. They're proud of it too! I don't get it and have mostly avoided meat, though the seafood is good. At least I know what it is when I have seafood, yesterday I had a whole fish, whole crab and a big prawn. Though I didn't finish it all because there was so much. The food on our tour just didn't stop coming, I was worried at first that we wouldn't get enough - I needn't of worried.

15/04
The weather is looking a little better to day so we planto go for a stroll around the town and maybe check out some of the sights. We stroll around the lake and end up having lunch at a good place (Ciao Cafe, near the lake.) It isn't cheap by Vietnamese standards but the food is great as isthe atmosphere. We plan to go to Ho Chi Minh's mausoleum next but after finding out that it was presently shut went to the war museum. We catch a taxi to the war museum and travel a few kms but the cost is only 18000 Dong. Entry fee at the war museum was 15000 Dong each plus the same for a camera (10000 Dong = NZ$1). We spend a couple hours checking out the museum and take a bunch of photos of both captured and Vietnamese war machines. Some of the artillery and tanks are huge but the helicopters are my favourites. Dinner out at crappy restaurant, food was frozen and reheated (at least that's what we think!) Back home after dinner and watch a few movies on cable tv (most the channels are fuzzy but viewable, a couple can't be seen at all.)

16/04
Today we decide we'll try for the Ho Chi Minh mausoleum (stilt house and palace.) Unfortunately it's closed at the time we arrive and so we decide to carry on for lunch at the Ciao Cafe from yesterday. We slept in today under the premise that we should be getting into London time, hence the relatively early lunch ;) My lunch is a bit more average than yesterday (pizza) but Trudie enjoys her pasta. After lunch I grab a can of Orangina (orange juice), wouldn't do this again - it's not very nice.

Round the corner is the water puppet show, we decide to call past and check out ticket prices and show times. As luck has it turns out there is a show starting in 10 minutes and we can get some aisle seats for 20000 Dong each. We grab the tickets and file in. We don't buy a camera ticket (as we have no money left!) but I take some photos anyway, though they're a bit dark to see anything. The show is pretty good and definitely worth the money and time (goes for about 45 minutes), even our aisle seats were comfy enough for this time. There is a Vietnamese band to the left and the water stage in the middle. The show is divided into 17 segments that blend together to constitute the show. We both enjoy the show.

On the way back to the guesthouse we come across shoe street. Now let me explain, Hanoi seems to have all these streets that support a single kind of product or perhaps range of product. For example, around the corner from us is stainless steel street where people bang day and half the night making oven hoods, cabinets and fire flues. Round from there is sunglass street, and then hat street and so on. So, we came across shoe street. I'd been planning to get another pair of shoes so we take a look. Most of the shoes look to be good quality rip-offs but we think we can get them cheap. The staff in the shop, as usual, invite us in and ask us our size and bring us shoes they think we'd like. We don't succumb to the ploy and browse around ourselves. I find a few pairs and so does Trudie, we try them on and find that I like a couple of pairs and Trudie does also. Just fo reference I run next door to find out some pricing (they have prices on the shoes next door). And the bargaining begins, we want 3 pairs of shoes total and are prepared to walk out if we don't get a good price. The shop assistant starts at 585k, 385k and 300k for the shoes - total of 1270000 Dong. This price is, of course, way too high. We counter offer 500k for the 3 pairs, which they are disgusted with. Eventually after much bargaining we end up paying 620k for the three pairs (less than NZ$60 and a bargain). We're happy. Back to the guesthouse and then out for dinner. We decide to go to Trong Khach, which has a set menu and is quite cheap. They have western food and have been handing out flyers at the water puppet show. It's only aruond the corner from us and we've passed it a couple times and thought it looked OK. We arrive and are seated, I order the set menu with BLT sandwiches as the main and Trudie goes for a big pizza. The meal turns out to be pretty good, though I wouldn't say great. The set menu is only 39000 Dong and Trudie's pizza is 55000 Dong, all together it comes to about NZ$10 so pretty good for western food.

We've decided that we should stay up late and sleep in so that we're getting closer to London time, we leave tomorrow so the less jet-lag the better. We messed up our arrival dates so we have a day less than anticipated so jet-lag won't be appreciated! We watch a movie and a couple documentaries on discovery and fall asleep at midnight.

17/04
As planned we sleep in but can only stay asleep until 9:30. I go down grab our breakfast and bring it back up to the room. Trudie's still in bed so it's breakfast in bed. We do have a nice deck though the sun isn't out and it's not that warm yet.

Have been for another stroll about the town. Trudie has picked up a pair of seeing glasses with correct prescription lenses for 23000 Dong which is only about NZ$20! Wow, what a bargain. I grabbed a bag, just an over the shoulder job. Weve got our jeans on now are all packed up, waiting for the taxi to come. Off to the airport then Vietnam air to Hong Kong, then British Air to London!

Talk to you then - this ends this part of our journey!

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