Northern Vietnam- Hanoi and Ha Long Bay
Trip Start
Jul 27, 2006
1
75
93
Trip End
Ongoing
Hanoi,
Vietnam
Sunday, December 30, 2007
Off to a great start we went out to explore the city and were attacked by endless motor-bikers asking us one after another down the street if we wanted a ride. Sounds fun- but imagine if you were in the Macy's Christmas Day Parade and everyone single person watching the parade stopped you to ask you if you wanted to get up and join the parade. In the end, part of me just wanted to hop on a bike for the sake of getting it over with. Not that I had anywhere to go... but at least if I was sitting on a bike riding somewhere I probably would enjoy a moment of silence.
With all of Hanoi's loveliness (wink wink) we decided to take two day trips out of the city
Hoan Kiem Lake
. One to Ha Long Bay (in the running to be one of the new 7 natural wonders of the world) for New Years and one to the Perfume Pagoda- that turned out to be the biggest joke ever. Yay for day trips, and Hanoi!We were really excited to see Ha Long Bay. It's known to be a gorgeous area on the north east coast of Vietnam, and is currently in the running to be one of the new 7 natural wonders of the world (feel free to go and cast your vote after you see the pics.) The tour started out strong with a 3 hour van ride (that ended up taking double that time cause we got picked up first- lucky!) to the bay, then a short boat cruise through the rock formations, followed by a trip to Dau Go cave which was discovered anywhere from the 1700s till yesterday, depending on who you ask. Something about a lady marrying a dragon and all the animals in the animal kingdom coming to the wedding... Apparently if you look close you can still see them all on the cave walls... but when we questioned their location the guide told us we needed to have a GREATER imagination. With that, I figured two could play at that game. I started finding all sorts of animals- an owl, the lochness monster, and even my little brother Tyler....
The boat brought Mel and I back to Tuan Chau Island where we shacked up for the night in some resort area, ready to have the New Years of a life time. Unfortunately Vietnamese people don't actually believe in celebrating their own New Year... they'd rather celebrate everyone else's
Bridge to the Turtle Pagoda
. While eating dinner at 7 there was a count down and a big celebration, and later at 10 pm there was another. What happened at midnight? Absolutely NOTHING! We went to check out a water/laser/music show and were encouraged to buy tickets and go in and sit down, even though the show had already ended. When we asked for our money back, they pretended as if they no longer understood us. Stranded on the island (which might be great in the summer when you can hang out on the sandy beach and go swimming) we retorted back to our hotel room where we could curl up in blankets to stay warm. Not about to let the stroke of midnight pass without a *bit of excitement, we built a countdown explosive device out of the matches we pawned off the rude staff. [When I say rude it's for a reason, not just me being mean... one person actually hid under the front desk because she didn't want to help us, while another had to be DRUG down stairs by the collar to take us to see the other part of the island. Don't worry- I didn't drag him, the manager did.] We stacked the matches up so that we could light one on top and they would subsequently light each other down to the base, one after another. It only took us 4 boxes to get it right- but we lit the last structure to have its final kaboom at the EXACT stoke of midnight- so we saw that as a sign that the New Year was going to be fabulous. Hey, we were getting off the island on January 1st- that's a good start right? Giddy with glee we were too excited to notice that the smoke alarm went off...
Working Women
. Checking out of the hotel the next day was liberating. But before leaving, we took a trip back to the show area and hassled the security man from the night before until he caved and let us into the dolphin show for free. Shockingly enough- there were no actual dolphins in the show, just two seals and one very angry trainer. (And that was only a rough over view of the Ha Long Bay tour... I'll leave the Perfume Pagoda Tour details up to your imagination.)
Other fun things in Hanoi included:
*many hours exploring 36 streets that looped and twisted in circles above the city, known as the Old Quarter.
*chilling out by the huge lake that the city is built around.
*endless pho and bubble tea
Mel really liked Hanoi, but I think I could have done with out it. The town was so clogged with tourists and people out to get tourists. No matter where we went, we were constantly being hassled by people on the street (bread sellers, motor bikers, tourist shop owners, fruit salespeople, and then some.) It might sound interesting... but imagine if you were in the Macy's Day Christmas Parade and every single person watching the parade stopped you to ask you if you wanted to buy something. It was nice that they could speak English and all... but I got so sick of hearing the word 'lady'. At one point I was actually tempted to just get on one of the stupid motorbikes JUST to avoid the next 67 bikers from asking me the exact same question.
Deep breathing.....
