Hanoi.....Welcome to Vietnam

---

Hey Guys,

Well after Vang Vieng we headed into Vientiane which is the capital of Laos to catch a flight to Hanoi. There's no blog entry for Vientiane since there wasn't much there. The only interesting thing were the massages we got as they included a chest massage. Yes, this was also a boob massage for Tyne!

Our arrival into Hanoi started off with our shuttle bus driver trying to take us to every Hostel but the one we wanted but we finally got him straightened out. It is still amazing when the scams you read about in your guide book are actually happening to you, but since we were on to his tricks we managed to lose only a little time.

Hanoi is the capital of Vietnam and with close to 4 million people, most of who are on a scooter it is pretty busy. We decided to take in some of the sights and decided to just walk and tour the city on our own. Walking the city can be pretty hectic since the sidewalk is used for everything from doing laundry, cooking meals, make shift welding shops and small restaurants. We visited the Temple of Literature (Van Mieu), this was built in the 11th Century and was Vietnam's first national University. The grounds of the Temple house five courtyards, a large coy pond and several beautiful buildings and Shrines to past Teachers. After the Temple we grabbed a taxi to the Vietnam Museum of Ethnology. The museum is fairly large and houses a large collection of everyday artifacts from Vietnamese life throughout the years, as well as having several traditional huts/houses on display outside as well. We ended our day by enjoying a meal and a sundowner on the banks of Hoan Kiem Lake.

The next morning we left Hanoi to grab the local bus to Haiphong which will be our jumping off point to get to Cat Ba Island and hopefully a tour of Halong Bay and the surrounding sights.

Until the next one.

Cheers,

Matt & Tyne

---