Heart and soul of Vietnam

Trip Start Dec 14, 2007
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Trip End Mar 16, 2009


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Flag of Vietnam  , Hanoi,
Sunday, April 27, 2008

First of all I must apologise for to all our frequent readers for the delays in posting the past few entries but we have had so little time in the past few days that we didn't even have time to read. I have managed to find an available 50 minutes on the train between Osaka and the airport (which we hope we will reach on time as we didn't anticipate the train would take 50 minutes).
 
Back to Hanoi.... Even though Hanoi it is the capital of Vietnam it seems to be Saigon's little sister. In many ways it is similar but has a much stronger French colonial influence in its older buildings. The hotel we stayed in was in the centre of the city and we spent many hours walking the tiny streets taking in the sight and sounds.
 
In the area we were staying we found a couple of fantastic restaurants and thoroughly enjoyed our dinners and desserts. One of the highlights were fresh Vietnamese spring-rolls which are filled with vegetables and wrapped in a thin almost transparent pastry as well as the many French influenced desserts like crepes, crème caramel and crème brule.
 
A visit to Vietnam is not complete without seeing a water puppet show (quote from the flyer) View from our hotel room
View from our hotel room
 . On our last night in Hanoi we had a quick dinner and then made our way to the theatre. As usual the seating was designed for either children or very short people, fortunately I was on the isle which gave me the opportunity to stand every now and then. The show is staged over a pool of water and instead of the puppets being suspended from above they are propped up on long poles and appear to float on the water. The puppets where beautifully crafted and decorated and even though the show was in Vietnamese it was still very entertaining and funny.
 
From Hanoi there are many day trips to the surrounding areas and we were able to cancel one s accommodation in Hanoi and instead book a trip to the world famous Halong Bay.
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