Hong Kong to Hanoi

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Quickest day in Hong Kong ever arrived at my hostel around 4pm with a broken elevator i had to climb 9 floors with all of my luggage not a happy happy. After swapping around all my bags i shot off to the post office to see if it would bankrupt me to send a box home. Later i met up a friend who is kindly taking care of my luggage and he invited me to dinner with his family home cooked food! Was very nice to sit and chat for a few hours before heading back to the hostel for sleep. Early next day shipped my box off and headed to the airport again god im becoming a regular.

I arrived in Hanoi only a few hours later and just as i arrived at my hostel it was free beer o clock the hostel offered free beer between the times 5 - 5:15, 6-6:15 and 10 - 10:30 im all over this after the last few days i took the its as much as you can drink in the time very literally and got myself a wee bit drunk oops. The cathedral outside my window very kindly woke me up at 5am so i could take some pain killers and go back to bed but i swear those bells kept going just to annoy me.

I met some lovely girls from France and Canada and i spent the majority of the next day with them we went on an exploration to find a railway line and ended up having a tour of half the city trying to find it but we did in the end and we had a nice walk and a laugh as we went and i also got to try egg coffee as strange as it sounds it actually turned out to be quite nice the egg gives it a somewhat creamy texture. That night as a group we treated ourselves to Pizza Hut and all wobbled back to the hostel afterwards.

My third day i actually did something productive and went on a boat trip to the famous area of Ha Long bay so many people told me to go but it was a fair distance to travel it took 4 hours by mini bus to get there luckily i started chatting to a couple from London that were hilarious and the time flew by as we exchanged random stories. When we got on the boat we then paired all together with a group of guys from Sri Lanka who pulled out a bottle of vodka. Let's get this party started then. We sailed around for the day and even managed to get a little sun on the top deck in between stops. I went on a little bamboo boat and the lady that was rowing us was really sweet and funny taking pictures for the people in the boat only me and a couple from South Korea that were also very nice. We walked around caves and were pointed in the direction of rocks that were supposed to look like things such as chickens and incense burners its a little like making pictures out of clouds but its funny anyway. At the end of the day we had to take the 4 hour bus journey back to Hanoi which was a little more tedious than the journey there the seats were not the most comfortable, but we got there in then. After a few free beers i headed straight to bed.

Last full day what to do... i took a stroll around the lake and had an ice cream then headed back to the hostel and had a rather chilled afternoon chatting to some other backpackers on various journeys. I'm quite happy Hanoi turned out to be quit a chilled out place with not a great deal to see because it meant i could slow down and relax a little bit before heading off to the next place.

I got to try a little traditional food but it is very similar to Chinese food such as soup noodles fried noodles and rice dishes although i had some nice seafood on the boat and the spring rolls are a million times better than home. I'm sure i will try more along my way to the south.

So now im sat in the airport ive finally caught up with this blog as id lost it a little in Tokyo lets see what's next flying to the ancient capital of hue.

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