Arrival and Day 1

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The flight over

I must say, Cathay pacific is by far and away the best airline I have flown. Aside from the gruelling 21 hours on a plane, (not including stop overs) the experience was pretty good. I got to baby sit a 10 month old baby girl named Monica from 2 rows in front of me. I caught her before she escaped down the aisle, away from mommy. Cathay constantly stuffed our faces giving us food every 4-5 hours. The beer and wine is complementary. Every seat has on demand television with about 50 movies, and even more television shows. Now to our actual trip.

Day 1

Well, fellow internetians, since my friends back home want us to upkeep this site to make sure we are alright, we are gracing you with the privilege to join us on this journey as we head through Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, Laos, and China. This itinerary is not final and will be changed at the travellers' discretion. Anything we write is purely views and experiences of our own.

Immigration and customs went pretty swiftly, just show your visa and passport, no questions, and you're through. Upon leaving the baggage claim backpackers will be approached. Now when I read about the hawkers I thought they would be insistant and abusive. Not the case. A simple no with the wave of the hand and shake of the head will let them know and you are on your way.

Qing and I did get into a little tussle about how to get into the city from the airport. In the guide mentioned a shuttle bus from the airport to the city. Stupid me went to the mentioned concrete island looking for a shuttle bus, specifically the vietnam airlines shuttle bus ignoring all attempts of taxi drivers and minibuses to get my business. Qing on the other hand said the minibus was the way to go. I vehemonently refuse to go and walked back into the airport to look at the guide. Well lets just say she was right, it was a "minibus shuttle". The ride was a pretty good bargain, $2 each, as opposed the $10 that the taxi would charge. The minibus would also drop you off at the hotel you are staying in. Don't believe lonely planet saying it drops you off at the minibus office.

As some of you know, we had no prearrange hotel set up. So we just got off the bus with a big group of guys from Australia. We are staying at the Camilia 5 in the old quarter. The hotel was asking for 15 we got it for 12, which is still probably a rip off. But we have hot water and free internet. So no complainants.

The one thing that we noticed about this place is the fumes! My gosh, the fumes from the motorbikes is horrible and would put Elizabeth, NJ to shame. In futile attempts to walk around and not get carbon monoxide poisoning, Qing walked around with a scarf around her face. I can now understand why Anna only stayed 1 day here. We are stuck here for 2, the acclimation day and the site seeing day.

Another thing that I read about what the horrific state of the traffic. Past travellers note the disregard for traffic lights and the frogger skills one would need to cross the street. Again, not as bad as I thought it would be. If you can cross the street in Beijing or New York, then you can cross here. The traffic is slower and the drivers actually make an attempt to not hit you. No 50 points for hitting any pedestrians.

Well to end this day, we were unsuccessful at trying to stay awake to 5pm to avoid jetlag. A relaxing stroll through Hoan Kiem Lake and an exploratory trek through the old quarter only lasted about 2 hours. For those of you interested in coming here, Lonely Planet's South east asia on a shoe string is pretty acurate when it came to the map of the area.

We fell asleep at 4pm and are now up on Sunday at 6am.

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Photos

reference pic of us
taking daily pics of us to see how we've changed day by day

Our room
Camellia 5

Hoan Kiem
Stroll in the park on our first day

Qing's first beer
Think Pabst blue ribbon

Comments

[annie lau]

yay!
i'm glad you guys are safe and doing well :) keep updating :D :D

[Sam]

COME TO KOREA!
I don't believe you guys are in Asia and don't have Korea on your itinerary! Wasting an extra day in Vietnam and breathing in all the fumes will probably take a few days off your lives and will cost you in medical bills later as well. That's what you get for not coming to Korea!