We flew from Vientiane to Hanoi at 2pm. Before the flight we ate a pizza slice which when we ordered thought it would have been an actual large pizza, apparently not.
We arrived to a very hot and humid Hanoi (the hottest and most humid so far) and walked to our restaurant which was a 30 minute walk in a crazy crazy place. The traffic as mental man!!! Just walk and the traffic goes round you .Everyone hoots 2 let u know that they are coming, and there’s absolutely no road rage. Pedestrian crossings everywhere, but no traffic stops for ya .All I can say is that it’s so disorganised, but it works.
Disorganised chaos, that works. 3 million motorbikes, 6 million people do the math .Price of a motorbike is 2 -3 thousand, the same price as a water buffalo! Land is also extremely expensive also.
Dinner was at French restaurant called Little Hanoi, it sh
ould be re-named the bird cage , as there were birdcages everywhere, with no actual birds caged. We then walked the streets, saw random as things....live frogs. Tul tuk home......day over.Thursday 09 June- 8am tour 2 see Ho Chi Min’s preserved dead body. Aircon was devine...We then went 2 see one pillar pagoda this is where Vietnamese people come to worship buddah where as temples here are to worship ancestors and family members who has passed away. Next we all went to the Ho Chi Min museum, Helen Clarke was is one of the pics.
Next was koto restaurant. This is a restaurant where they take street children off the streets and train them to cook and give them life skills for further development later in life. It’s a well famous restaurant that is recommended by the lonely planet guide.
Next we took a tuk tuk to the lake and had a relaxing walk round the lake. Graham got an interesting hair cut, I was really worried there for a bit but it turned out good, a slight mohawk but all good. More markets and back 2 the hotel 2 ring DHL and sort Grahams baggage out that was being held by customs at Heathrow airport. Leah had filled in the forms and the recipients contact number (Graham’s sister) wasn’t very clear. Customs officials had been ringing the wrong number.....anyways. Vertical learning curve on skype .Had 2 ring NZ DHL, Vietnaam DHL, and UK in the space of 10 mins. All good now sorted.
Next was the water puppet show which was awesome !!!! After the show we had dinner and drinks to meet up with the new crew on the tour. It was also a farewell for Patricia, Sinade, and Victoria. After dinner we sum of us headed 2 a club ( dragonfly) to get on it .....a good night and good farewell. The taxi ride back 2 the hotel was immense and real exciting !!!! Graham thought the taxi driver was keen on him and put his hand on his leg and asked him if he liked the boom boom !!!! very very disturbing ....we later learnt that this is just their culture or being caring and friendly, he didn’t actually want Graham for himself but he wanted to take Graham some where to find a good time ;-) .
Friday 10 June - 8am bus ride to Halong Bay ( 4 hours trip) after saying our farewells to Patricia, Victoria, and Sinade.
We arrived at Bai Chay Port were we boarded our own private Junk boat. The police were almost not going to approve our paper work as a storm was coming in and they had declined a lot of other boats, so we were extremely lucky to get approval. The boat was fully kitted out all wooden inside and out. The boat consisted of 3 levels. The bottom level consisted of the bedrooms which were cosy and exceeded our expectations. The rooms were quite spacious for a small boat. The second level was the dining area, where it was set up for 5* dining and the top level was a sun floor with sun loungers, way to hot to stay up there for too long.
First we had some lunch on the boat, it was just about all seafood dishes and was just delicious.
We cruised over to the lime caves where we walked up to the caves and went inside, they were amazing, all lit up with different colours, it was quite impressive. Got some gorgeous photos up the top of the Bay and then back to the boat and cruised some more.
There was optional kayaking up for grabs which Graham and I participated in. We K
ayaked under some small rock formations to a blue lagoon and paddled back, took about an hour n a half. Back to the boat where everyone was diving and swimming of the side of the boat. Graham obviously opted for jumping in off the top, as high as he could go. The bay was so quite because as I mentioned earlier a lot of other companies were denied entry to Halong Bay so was quite tranquil. We watched the sun go down and had another flavour filled meal for dinner, then most people went to bed. Graham and I spotted a boat worker off the front of the boat with a fishing rod so we went over and started chatting to him. Apparently he was trying to catch squid, so we unsuccessfully joined in. The off to bed for a good sleep.Saturday 11th June – We had to be checked out of our rooms by 10am and up for lunch on the second floor at 11.30am. Half was through lunch and you could hear the thunder and see the storm cloud coming. Was nice being inside the boat when it absolutely poured down outside, a spectacular view and a trilling feeling. Luckily the rain subsided before we boarded the speed boat back to the port. On the way to Hanoi we stopped off at a large shop where disabled people were given jobs to make beautiful silk paintings and egg shell paintings. There was so much to choose from. Graham and I got 2 little silk embroider images, one of a Vietnamese woman carrying the large baskets and one of the sunset over Halong Bay.
We got back to the Nhat Tien hotel in Hanoi and had 1.5hours to buy food for the train.
We decided to order pizza from the hotel and then go and pick it up. What a disaster that was, never complicate things while talking to a Vietnamese person over the phone. We ended up with several pizza's some small and some large. Lesson learned, never complicate things in Asia.
We jumped on the train and foud it much nice than the last train, we got actual cabbins. We bunked with Danielle and Richard.
Sunday 12th June - We arrived in Hue (pronounced Way). The Ngoc Huong Hotel that we stayed at was great with a pool on the top floor and breakfast included.
After a quick swim in the pool the whole group decided to do the option city scooter tour, so
all 15 of us each had our own driver and scooter. It was great fun whizzing round the town and out to the country side to see people harvesting the rice. We went to a little place where we were taught step by step how rice was made. This well dress really old woman showed us the tools used and even sung in Vietnamese as she was demonstrating each one. She was so cute and tiny, such a lovely lady.We then went off to meet the famous Vietnamese woman who makes the straw hat things that everyone wears here. She only had one hand and make such creative hats.
We visited the Minh Mang Tombs, Thien Mu Pagoda, scooted up the hill to get a good shot of the perfume river and finally the Imperial Citadel.
Monday 13th June – Up early as usual to travel to Hoi An via the Hai Van Pass. The trip took about 4 hours. We stopped off for some refreshments and took a walk around up to the top of the stair to get some nice photos of the bay, it looked just like NZ, similar to The Mount or something. We arrive at the rather flash looking hotel with flash marble looking bathrooms.
Off to lunch down at the river where Graham enjoyed a Snapper steamed in banana leaf, which was amazing.
Richard the tour guide then took us on a walk to visit his preferred tailor. The ladies at the tailor were lovely, mine and Grahams lady especially, her nick name was SIM Card so that is what we called her. We decided to buy a few winter coats for England and some shirts and suits. The girls measured us up and then we just sat at the tailors getting pissed. Richard has an agreement with this particular tailor, he brings customers to their shop and everyone including him gets fresh fruit, cold water and unlimited amounts of Beer, 333. After several beers we were all feeling really happy and chatty and decided to get a few more clothes made.
Sim wanted a down payment on my clothes and I was having difficulty drawing money our at the ATM across the road so she offered to take me to another ATM to draw some money out. As I had unsuccessfully tried to draw money our on my card several times this ATM machine decided to take my card and not give it back. Sim tried calling the bank but it was closed and she offered to drive me to the bank in the morning to get my card back.
We went out for dinner tonight at an Italian restaurant called the Mango Room. The Vietnamese chef had spent several years in Italy learning how to cook Italian food and introduced himself and some of the ingredients he uses and then took our orders. Graham ordered a pasta and I decided to go for the Chimichanga’s, it sounded cool and I have never eaten them before, was rather disappointed as it was basically a deep fried tortilla so not that great. Everyone else really enjoyed their meals so I mush of been the unlucky one with the bad choice.
After dinner we looked around some of the shops and came across a dive shop so got information about the diving and went and sat in the bar. Claire and I chatted about girl stuff while Graham, Mark and Drew played a Vietnamese guy at pool. We had to leave suddenly when he Vietnamese guys wanted payment for winning when that was never the arrangement. I went back to the room and Graham stayed up a bit later with the boys.
Tuesday 14th June - Today we just wanted to chill out. So we hired some bicycles, Azy, Jonothan, James, Graham and I all biked down to the beach. The sand was so hot, a really clear sunny day. We relaxed down on the sand on lounger under a straw unbrella. Swim.....lounge out....then repeat. We met up with Mark, Claire and Danielle bought a frisbie and threw that around in the water for several hours. We kept feeling small little stings in the water but didn't think much of it, we later found out that there are tiny little jelly fish in the water.
We then went for another fitting at the taylors and off to dinner with the group. The streets were all lit up with beautiful lanterns as tomorrow night is the lantern festival. I wasn't feeling that great at dinner and unfortunatly didn't get to eat my beautiful meal of beef wrapped up in banana leaf, Graham and I went down to the dive shop and went to scuba diving at Cham Island. After filling out several forms I was told that I could not dive as I had asthma, was really kinda annoyed that I couldnt apparently I need a certificate from my doctor stating that I am fit enought to dive with out getting an asthma attack. I then went home to bed while Graham partied it up and got back at 3.30am, lads night out!
Wednesday 15th June - We were up early this morning for pick up. The Cham Island Dive Company picked us up at 8am. We drove to the port and jumped on the boat with about 25 odd other people. Graham unsuccessfully tried talking one of the owners into letting me dive, so snorkling it was. Graham went for 2 dives and I went for one big long snorkle. We snorkled so far that the boat had to come and pick us up. The boat dropped us off at this beautiful tropical island where we had some lunch and I got a grass mat and went and sat under an unbrella. Graham and the other divers joined us on the island after an hour or so after their second dive. Graham said his dive was good, they saw a sting ray, lots of baracudas and some red snapper. As we were chilling on the beach we could see the storm rolling in like a huge dark wave, was quite impressive looking, then it absolutly poured down.
We got back to the hotel around 5 and had to go for another fitting at the tailors. We went out to dinner as a group to a place Richard suggested that served good cocktails, I hat a Miss Hanoi and Graham has a Miss Saigon, there wern't too bad. The girls bought some little candles in little paper holder and floated them down the river to celebrate the landern festival and full mood, letting their sins float down the river. We then all went to some funky western bar and got a bed type of sitting area, was quite strange but neat.
Thursday 16th June - Final fitting at the taylors and got all our 14kg worth of stuff shipped to Grahams sister in England. Graham got an electric blue blazer and a grey blazer, a winter coat & 5 shirts tailored and I got a creme trench coat, purple hooded jacket, funky red coat with puffy neck, 3 piece suit, a suit skirs, another suit jacket with hot pink lining, a grey pinstriped corporate dress, a black colared dress and a black and gold oriental chinese style dress with toggles, and 4 shirts. Perfect stuff for interviews and winter in England. We were really happy with all our purchases.
Back to the hotel to pack and then on the bus to go to the airport. The flight departed at 2.30pm and only too 1 hours or so to get to Ho Chi Min City aka Saigon. We had some spare time at the hotel for a change so decided to Skype Grahams parents and update them on our travels. We went to dinner shortly after that at Bar 333, I had an awesome Vietnamese Chicken curry and Graham had an eggplant pasta thing which was supprisingly nice. No one went out tonight, everyone came back to the hotel for a good nights sleep.
Friday 17th June - 8am start on the bus to Chu Chi tunnels. Our guide for the day was really nice, he had these huge big turbo hairs coming out of the mole on his face, apparnetly they don't cut them as they are a sign of good luck. Was crazy to believe that the Vietnamese people lived undergroud for so many years, unbelieveable. They dug a larger tunnel for foreigners and even that was small, I tried to go in there but the idea of crawling on my hands and knees in this hot dark tunnel for who knows how long gave me a creeps, Graham did it ofcourse and got some great photos, check out Facebook for these. After the tunnels we had some complementary tapioka with a salt & peanut dip, was kinda nice I guess. After going to the Chu Chi tunnels we then went off to the museum. The bottom level was interesting all the different photos of countries protesting against the war and what the Americans were doing to the Vietnamese people. But the second level started getting quite graphic, with images of what the agent orange did to people and their children, such sad images of young babies. Graham couldn't see anymore so waited for me in the foyer. It was really interesting and informative, 3 millionwere confirmed dead & 2 million missing. We met up with the new group for dinner, we went to a cheap noodle bar and had massive big bowls of noodles that no one could finish. Went to an Australian bar that same night where Graham managed to order a CC & dry........they don't seem to sell Ginger Ale in Asia so he was so excited to have one. We partied it up there for a while and when they started closing we felt like we wanted a boogey. So off to this night club where it was 'spot the non prostitute' I think us and all the dirty western guys were the only people not prozzies. Left the bar at 3.30am and a late on to bed for us.
Satruday 18th June - Up at7.15am, and with only about 3 hours sleep we were not feeling much in the mood. We went to a small village to see how they made rice wine and snake rice wine and tried them both. Well I think Graham was the only one to try the snake rice wine.........not only where there heaps of dead snakes in the jar there was also a dead bird in there for good measure. Apparently the guide was saying that it is good to drink for your lady.......aka Viagra substitute. They also made popped rice which was neat to watch and also rice paper in the making. We went to a house for lunch where there 3 old guys played music for us and then a lady and another guy sang in Vietnamese about love stories. Lunch was good and cheap. We went for a little ride in one of the paddel boats, the ones where the lady rows from the back of the boat. We got back to the hotel at 4.30pm and had a free night where Graham and I went out and had curry for a change.
Off to Cambodia tomorrow.
welcome to Vietnam again.
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