Hanoi and the Ancient Capital

---

Even after travelling in different parts of the world the airport security never ceases to amaze me. Every airport is slightly different, you can never fully anticipate what what you exaclty need to do. May be that is intentional to keep those targetted guessing, I don't know. Some places you can keep your computer in the bag, other places they have to be scanned seperately. Some require you to take everything out of your pockets, even your hankys before the body scan. In other places you can even wear your belt with a large buckle. In Cairnes I saw a guy putting his duty free through the scanners without any doubt. I myself had forgotten to drink the water in the bottle and it had nearly a litre in it. It did not cause any problems not once but twice as I mistakenly wandered off into the arrival hall and had to get back to the departure lounge and go through the scanning again. But there was a smear test probably for explosives or drugs.Annoyingly after we had to gone through the regular check as normal, put the watch, the belt etc back on, we had to go through another check for international travellers. The strange thing was it was not half as rigorous as the first one.I only realised that it might have been better to take a route through Darwin and Bali than getting back down to Gold Coast and coming back up to Hanoi.

At Hanoi airport took a shuttle bus to the center of town, and a taxi to the hotel 5 USD all together. Instead of the taxi one guy offered to take me to the hotel on a motor bike, with the luggage for half the price which I had to decline. At 13 USD the hotel with a/c was a steal. And that includes cooked breakfast. Confirmed the two tours arranged one to Halong Bay the second to ancient temple and some caves on a river cruise.

I did the Halong Bay tour furst. That will follow this blog seperately. I still had nearly 2 days to fill. I chose a tour to the ancient capital of Vietnam, Han Lou and Tam Coc next. It was another hot day at 40ºC. The tour bus collected me from the hotel for a 3 hour slow drive to our destination. First we visited 2 temples in the the name of two dinasty kings who were adored inside each temple. The last king of the third dinasty decided to move the capital to Hanoi for security and for further expansion. The temples were nothing grandiose but set in beautiful surrondings with lotus ponds and ornamental entrance gates. Then we went to a kind of restaurant where there was a buffet lunch arranged. After lunch we went to the riverside. There were a lot of flat bottomed river boats managed by women. Each boat seated 2 persons. Only when we started to move I noticed a strange thing. The woman was using only her legs to use the ores. And insted of pulling the ores in the water she was pushing the ores. I don't know how she keeps the ores on her feet, but was managing it beautifully. I offered to assist her (two able boadied men in the boat and a woman peddling you) and she gave me an ore which I used it through out most of the trip. Actually working in the heat made it somehow bearable.

As we moved up along the river we were treated to the most beatiful scenery you would see anywhere. The river itself was only a slow flowing shallow stream, the rice fields were on both sides almost overflowing into the river. On both sides there were high hills, similar to the islands in Halong Bay. As we moved up stream through the crystal clear water we found that we had to go through a cave. This was repeated twice more before we came to the end of the journey. Longest of the caves was over 400m and in places we had duck our heads to prevent our heads hitting the roof. To go any further would have been difficult through the growth in the river which were not cleared. After a brief rest we started our way back. Altogether it took under 2 hours. It was a beautiful surprise for all who went there, nobody was expecting such stunningly beautiful views. The only downside was the time to get there and back, travel time alone over 7 hours and the scorching heat and humidity.

As I had to be at airport by 0320hrs I could only take on a half day tour of Hanoi on the last day. We visited one of the oldest pagodas in Hanoi on a lake which had been moved there from the other shore of the lake. There were multiple statues of Buddha depicting various forms for the happiness of the people. There was also a banyan tree, seedling brought by Dr. R. Prasad, Indin President, on his visit, the seedling from a cutting from the original banyan tree under which Buddha said to have attained enlightenment.

The next place was Ho Chi Minh's Mausoleum set in a very large square. We watched the changing of the guards, and then went to see Minh's gardens and house. At first he was staying in the French governer's place but as he thought it inappropriate to stay in such luxurious conditions he moved to an adjoining bengalow and later to a purpose built small house which represented houses in his native land. It had large pond with fish and the garden itself was beautiful and a refuge from the heat with a variety of trees and flowering plants. Strange enough, there was a small temple of "lady buddha" with a child in his/her hand (obviously there is story attached to that). He died in 1967 but the vietnamese has such reverence for the father of their nation.

Next on the list was a education complex built by an earlir dynasty to spread education, first to the princely class then to royal officers families and eventually to the masses. There very strict qualifying hurdles for the commoners. On successful completion of the their education the king himself checked their attaiments and awarded their qualifications. Today there were some university students celebrating their success in the exams and had come to pray for the future. There were gate after gate to go through before you came to the inner sanctum all ornamentally decorated. Later visited a work area for handicapped people. They were doing different artwork and trying to sell their goods. From here we were taken to a sumptuos lunch. That is another thing, normally I am never hungry. But it might the heat after a good cooked breafast I was already hungry for my lunch. After lunch I had to leave the tour group, a friendly bunch of boys and girls. The hotel had sent somebody on a motorbike to pick me up. I had a shower and change of clothes before I got the taxi and headed for the airport which was 40km away.

---