Hanoi 1
Trip Start
Sep 03, 2007
1
173
220
Trip End
Jun 17, 2009
Hanoi,
Vietnam
Thursday, September 11, 2008
After the forty five minute trip to the airport we check in and go through passport control. In the modern departure lounge are a great array of luxury goods shops and an unsurprising JW rating of 5.
Then it's the first security check, where we have to empty all big items out of our hand baggage. There are a few seats near to the entrance to our departure lounge, which is closed off. With an hour and a half before our flight the lounge opens and another security check, who takes all our water off us, so we have to wait without being able to get a drink
Descending into Hanoi
. We were puzzled as to why the first checked allowed water and the second didn't, I suppose it's a case of left and right hands!We board the Airbus A321, which is only half full and quite spacious, a nice change. During the 1 hour fifty minute flight we enjoy a good meal, served by a polite and efficient crew, a little turbulence and we are then descending into Hanoi, the surrounding landscape being very green and fertile.
Immigration is stern and (silently) thorough, before we move on to the baggage game - Yes, three. Goooooood Afternooooon Vietnammmm!
We find an ANZ (Australia New Zealand) bank in the exit hall with an ATM and I realize I've forgotten the exchange rate, so I guess. You'll like this! 200,000 VND (Vietnamese Dong) - that should do it. Then the memory cells kick and I hesitate. We check the exchange rate at the bank desk and find out there are 30,000 VND to the pound - so we've just pulled about seven pounds sterling. Now I know things are cheaper over here but I don't think we're going too far on that! Back to the monopoly money machine (called an ATM) and we try again. Our card behaves once more and we are millionaires with 2,000,000 VND - 66 pounds sterling, that should do us for a while
Chicken in a basket
.Enquiring about a taxi at an information desk, we are told they are all outside and the fare to the city is about 250,000 dong. Looks like we're going to be spending like millionaires as well! The spirit of enterprise is developing in Vietnam and there are several different companies vying for business. The first one says "300,000 plus tolls". Norah relishes this and offers him (the standard) 250K. As the other taxi companies sense an opportunity and start to close in, our man relents, says OK and we're off to the city.
The main roads are busy, with many interchanges and flyovers and an amazing number of small motorbikes, which apart from being the main people carrier here (we did see a family of four on one bike) are also used to carry goods as defined under the 'absolutely anything and everything plus a little bit more' road traffic act. We see a couple riding tandem with a complete, dead pig draped across the back, then a crowd of (live) ducks stuffed in plastic shopping bags with their heads poking out but the mega one was a girl on a Honda 50 with two stacks on each side of the bike, of over forty high, full egg trays. I was that gobsmacked I couldn't take a picture. It was an amazing sight. Whether she was in the breakfast business with the couple with the pig I don't know
Vietnam house
! This was the norm.The road was lined with big rice fields, water seeming to not be a problem here and housing estates with a few businesses. The main feature of the buildings was that they were very narrow, about four metres wide and four storeys high. We surmised (later it seems correctly) that land, where available, is scarce and all buildings are narrow and tall.
Our taxi got slower and slower as we got further into the city and we were overwhelmed with motorbikes. They came in swarms from every direction and poured round the cars and trucks like rampaging ants. Traffic rules just went out the window, the only rules being to keep moving at any cost and sound your horn.
The city was of mostly old buildings from the (French) colonial days and we passed the impressive Ho Chi Minh's mausoleum, the Presidential Palace and the city's Turtle Lake. Ever slower, we eventually arrived at our hotel, a dated but comfortable place with substantially carved wooden furniture.
It was now about 4pm and we decided to be adventurous and go for a walk
Hanoi's motorbikes
. Leaving our valuables in the hotel safe and not displaying the camera, we ventured out onto the (now) even busier streets. The pavements were mostly blocked with parked motorbikes, people sitting outside the small cafes or working in the front of their shops or businesses repairing bikes, washing machines, cookers, anything. I was impressed by Bangkok but that had merely been the warm up act. If Bangkok was lively, Hanoi is frantic.Using the (tiny) amount of pavement available and walking mostly in the road, dodging bikes or walking round the myriad items dumped in the gutter as a sort of bespoke rubbish removal system, we hit our first junction. Our mistake, waiting for the traffic to stop - it doesn't! OK, pick the most likely time and start walking and just keep walking slowly. The traffic parts round us, like Moses walking through the Red Sea and even the guys on the wrong side of the road going against the flow avoid us. Easy - just walk and let them sort it out. Walking across the four lanes of the M62 would be kid's stuff after this!
The array of (narrow) shops is mesmerizing, wedding gowns next to hardware shops, jewellers next to motor bike repairs, electric motors (of all shapes and sizes) next to chocolate cake shops, The mix is incredible and all the time around us is the overwhelming cacophony of bikes, cars, coaches and the odd truck, as they rush by us, with pedestrians and street vendors, carrying goods in baskets hanging from wooden shoulder yokes, mixed in for good measure
Street scene
. Five hundred yards up the road the novelty wears off - (for that read nerves become frayed and bottle starts to go), so we head back to the hotel whilst we're still winning and still in one piece.At 6pm is our group briefing for the first stage of the 17 day trip of Vietnam, Cambodia and (back to) Thailand. Our leader is a young Vietnamese 'Phuoc' (pronounced Foo as in Kung Foo) and the rest of the group are Andy and his wife Wyn (Chinese ex pats from Australia) and Nim and her friend Karen from Warrington and Leeds respectively.
Phuoc outlines the trip, which at 17days is two trips rolled together and he will be with us for the first part of ten days. First stage is to travel for a light overnight stay and we start at 8am.
We repack (getting good at this) and meet for a team supper. A minibus takes us across town, where the bikes are just as crazy in the dark and we see many shops selling decorations and festival 'moon cakes'. This is for the weekend's 'moon festival', a combination of a harvest festival timed to co-incide with a full moon and it's an event as big as Christmas.
Our supper is Asian and delicious, washed down with Hanoi beer and cheap (but over seven quid!). The bills are paid in US dollars or dong but any change comes in dong.
Out on the hot, night streets we walk along looking for a minibus taxi amongst the throngs of people and at the inevitable road junctions we keep walking and the swarms of bikes just flow round us.
The aircon makes the room comfortable and the serious double glazing keeps out the traffic noise, so we have a reasonable nights sleep.
