We are definately back in South-East Asia . . . and loving it!

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The sounds, the smells, the traffic - as soon as we arrived into Hanoi we knew we were back in South East Asia and were excited at the prospect. After a 10 hour sleeper bus from Sapa we were greeted by the usual taxi mafia trying to charge over inflated prices for the short journey into the Old Quarter so walked a few metres down the road and found a taxi at a fair price. We all sat down in a cafe to ice cold smoothies which were great as the change in temperature was already apparent even though it was only still 8am, then set off to find some accomodation for the next 2 nights. We found a small guesthouse and after haggling the price we checked in and had a quick rest before going out to find something to eat, which is when we discovered our new favourite daily breakfast - Ban My - so simple but so good and less than £1 each, you get a baguette filled with meat, egg, salad and chilli sauce - delicious!

Haggling is par for the course here, from hotels and taxi's to travel agents and market sellers, and we did plenty of this during our stay in Hanoi, trying to get the best bang for our buck whilst of course being fair. We spent our time wandering through the streets of the old quarter, dodging the many moto-bikes, looking in shops (Scott got some new sunglasses), eating yummy food (we are obsessed with Vietnamese spring rolls) and drinking lots of beer at the casual Bia Hoi places dotted on each corner - this is the cheapest beer in the world at less than 20p a pint and you sit on little low plastic stools whilst people watching - a terrible way to spend the afternoon. On our second day the Dutch guys also arrived from Sapa so we were 6 again and after introducing them to the Bia Hoi they were hooked on it aswell.

One evening the four of us went to see a water puppet show at the local theatre for something different, which was quite cultural rather than funny - it was ok, not thrilling but nice to see. We also took advantage of free drinks at Hanoi Backpackers one evening, a big establishment full of Western travellers - we were glad we weren't staying there but it was fun for a while. We visited the prison museum on Sunday afternoon which was interesting with lots of displays and facts on what Vietnam prisons were like - not somewhere you would want to find yourself. Other than that, we enjoyed just taking in the feel of a big SE Asia city again and really liked the feel of Hanoi. Agian the people seemed so friendly and we found a lovely lady in one of the many travel agents who we got on with and booked a one day - one way trip to Halong Bay ending in Cat Ba through her for the next day which we were really looking forward to...

S&V's Travel Info & Tips:

General Info: Approx 33,000 VND to £1 / 21,000 VND to $1.

Transportation: From Sapa we were transported on back of moto-bikes (with big bag on back and small on front) about 1.5km to the bus terminal, we then bordered our overnight bus which drove 1 hour to Lao Cai to pick up more passengers. We stopped several times in the night and finally arrived into Hanoi at 6.30am, the jounrye cost 300,000 VND. The Old Quarter in Hanoi can be covered on foot and we did not need any transport other than when our bus arrived to leave for Halong Bay.

Food: We found a great local Vietmanese restaurant called My Day which claims to have one of the top ten cheap eat's in the World. I wouldn't go quite that far but the food was good and most dishes were 50,000 VND (We ate here three times).

Accomodation: After hunting around and viewing several different guesthouses, we stayed on Ma May at a place called Nam Hai 2 - very reasonable and good wi-fi in room.

Other observations:

x) Hanoi's Old Quarter is a maze of small streets, back in the day each street was allocated a specific merchandise to sell and today this area is known as '36 streets'. For example, 'Hang Luoc' street translates as 'Comb' street and this is the only item which would be sold. Other more modern versions include; SunGlasses Street, Shoe Street and Beer Street.

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