Russian Hot Rods & Conmen

---

This morning I found myself eating breakfast with Mark & a non-too-happy-to-be-awake-Adam joined us much later. That afternoon we indulged in a little cinema, The Painted Veil. Great movie although love a story set amongst a cholera epidemic might not be the best flick to catch after brushing my teeth with the water for the last 2 weeks! That evening we grabbed a flight to Hanoi and let me just say, our honeymoon in Saigon was over...the long hard list of lessons learned in Vietnam we soon to be upon us. Upon arrival in Hanoi we were immediately accosted by a wandering chap pounding on our taxi cab window saying how he had a fabulous cheap hotel room for us. Given the hour & our inability to get our cab driver to run him over we eventually gave in & ended up getting conned into a crap hotel. Lesson #1: avoid the overzealous salesman at all cost, he will hose you.

Hanoi is a very bustling town & prideful of the communist regime. Work, work, work is the moto with streets & their vendors each given a speciality. Hardware row, jewelry street, rice, noodles, Tet decorations, you name it. There was even a street consisting entirely of vendors selling buttons! That afternoon we met a nice student by the lake who chatted us up inquiring about our lives & telling us more about himself in Vietnam. He even took us for a egg coffee which I rather quite enjoy, then BAM, out of the blue here is comes! The con...would you like to eat at the snake farm? No other markets are open tonight...are you kidding me? Lesson #2: Egg coffee ain't free. In a last ditch effort to avoid eating reptiles, we claimed a craving for Indian food & we were off roaming the streets again. After many dark corners & alleys we stumbled across a jewel. We dined in a tiny hole in the wall with the Vietnamese, drank beer & I even bought a bottle of vodka for the celebrating Vietnamese friends. Which, of course, they had us partake in. As we walked off the dinner we passed through vibrant streets still grazing on foods from street vendors--banana leaf wrapped rice, steamed bread with sausage & much more. Eventually we settled down with a little family & some beer & I fell in love with a little Vietnamese boy nearly trying to take him home with me. Great night!

The next morning was spent bringing to the light the grandiose idea of traveling to Halong Bay & then Northern Vietnam on motobike. Yes, we would rent one & be off on our own, winding blowing through our hair, enjoying the countryside. Let's just say it did not quite work out that way. The hotel tried to overcharge me for the hotel room about 40 bucks. Adam got lost in the Old Quarter on our new rental and eventually around 3:30 we headed off for Haiphong about 100 km away. The moto ride on our new (hardly!) hot Russian wheels, the purchase of my Vietnamese green racing jacket & a few stops for hot, yet incredibly nasty, green tea was rather enjoyable until we managed to lose two gears. Eventually we made it to a hotel & crashed with Two Buck's competition, Dalat wine, & some cheese. Oh the comedy of errors to come.

---

Comments

[nikkid]

I love all these travels on the motorbikes! Sounds like you are having quite an adventure! I'm glad you have Adam to zip through the city and countryside with! it really sounds like you having an excellent time!