See Travel Blog

We arrived into Hanoi from Dublin at around 7am local time this morning (via Doha).  Upon arrival, it looked like immigration weren’t equipped to deal with us.  There were about 5/6 staff covering passport checks for some 400/500 travellers and queues weren’t really moving. We must have spent around 90 minutes in that queue!

Eventually when we made it through the other side, our tour guide Ly was waiting with a sign saying Simon Hull.  I took that to mean that I was the most important in the group!  

She wasn’t too chuffed with our delay but there was nothing we could do about that! 

Ly made a call and soon a grey minivan arrived to pick us up. 

The bus took us on a roughly twenty minute journey from the airport to our hotel in the city centre.  First impressions were the traffic was crazy (which we knew to expect) and the natural landscape was beautiful (even in the early morning smog).  The city appears to be quite run down on the outskirts at least from what I’ve seen so far.

The bus arrived at our first hotel in Hanoi – the Nesta Grand Hao.  Bags were unloaded by the driver and hotel porter and we made our way to check one. There was a little confusion over tipping, and our room wasn’t ready, so they sent us to have breakfast in the hotel restaurant while they finish.

The breakfast buffet selection gave a first taste of Vietnamese cuisine (with an international twist).  I had a boiled egg, cocktail sausages, cold cut meats, crimped cheese, yoghurt, donut and little coconut cake slice.  Special marks to the hotel’s Halloween themed bread display.

After breakfast, the rooms were now ready. I had 705 and mum and dad 704.  Both rooms were equipped with state of the art Japanese style robot toilets.  After taking a dump, I tried out the cleansing options and a warm stream of water shot up my bum.  It honestly felt like I had diarrhoea and the stuff was being sucked out of me.  Turned out it was just the water.  

Problem was that the thing felt so weird, my first instinct was to stand up, and that streak of water shot all over the floor.  Thankfully the toilet had a dryer function (for my bum not the floor).  The other weird thing about the bathroom was that there was a window through to the bedroom with a retractable blind.  Why tho?  

Eventually we got rounded and headed out to the streets to sample day to day life in Hanoi.  Almost… a couple of streets in and mum realised she’d left her glasses in the room.  We had to go back and start again.

It was while waiting outside the hotel that i noticed for the first time, a man feeding paper into a fire pit or stove.  This turned out to be a pretty common sight (and smell) on our first day in Hanoi, and the reason being that they often burn paper to honour loved ones who have died.  Recent reports have said that this is dying off a bit, but i spotted a lot of people today doing it.

We decided to walk randomly through the city.  Our hotel location isn’t the most central, so it was around 2/3km walk to the old quarter, but decided this would be a good way of getting our bearings and a feel for the place.

A couple of initial observations.  The footpaths aren’t really suitable for pedestrians to walk on, they’ve been filled with tables / chairs / parked motorbikes and everything else, to the point where there isn’t actually any space left.  If you decide to walk on the footpath, it’ll not be very long before you have to walk around something into a busy road.

There are a lot of shops, and these tend to be grouped by category on one street.  We walked past a piano shop, then about another 3/4 beside that on the same street.  Didn’t see a piano shop the rest of the day.  Same for paper, sinks, Christmas decorations, coffee shops etc.

Also at the side of the road are restaurants, and some of the stuff we saw would be enough to horrify food hygiene inspectors.  Grown people are sitting eating on what look to us like plastic kids tables and chairs.  Beside that people are washing dishes with a hose.  The blend of smells are potent but everyone seems to be having a great time.

Crossing the road is also an experience.  I had heard this before we went, and the advice was just start walking and traffic will weave around you.  That’s pretty much how it works.  There are only a few proper traffic light crossings, and even then you’re dodging the traffic when it’s green to cross.  There’s a total laissaiz faire attitude to traffic.  Anything and everything goes.  

We eventually stumbled upon a set of train tracks down a busy road.  I’d heard and seen a bit about Hanoi’s train street before we came out.  Basically the train comes by 2/3 times a day and everyone has to clear everything up and get out of the way.  

It’s become a victim of its own success.  Because this is so popular with tourists, there are now too many people here when the train comes and there have been quite a few near misses with people playing chicken with the train- all for a nice photo for instagram.  

The aesthetics of train street are unmatched (so far), so we stopped for some cold drinks.  By this point (around 12:30pm) the temperature was in the mid 30s and all the walking was thirsty work.

There are dozens of little bars lining train street, but we just plumped for the first one.

While we were there, several street sellers came by one at a time selling everything from lighters and T-shirts to little paper decorations.  Thankfully these guys are nowhere near as bad as the ones in China and if you say no will just walk on without arguing.

After this we followed the tracks to the end of the road and spotted another pan with smouldering ashes in the middle of the tracks.  I sure hope someone remembered to lift it by the time the next train came.

A little further down the road, we came to Phung Hung Mural street, with some beautiful paintings depicting Vietnamese history.  The paintings are on the base of the Long Bien Bridge which looks like a bricked up viaduct.  

The murals are both tasteful and poignant, and were done in 2018 as a joint project between Vietnam and South Korea to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the diplomatic relationship between both countries.  

I was interested to see the Long Bien bridge across the river, but even after walking through a smelly fruit market, couldn’t find any decent and unobstructed view. Will try again tomorrow.

The heat was getting to us a bit by this point, so we walked into the (hopefully) shaded streets of the old quarter.  The entrance to this is marked by the Old Gate, and being over 250 years old, is probably worthy of the ‘old’ moniker.  The city was once walled, and this is was one of 16 entrances.  It’s the only one remaining.

The old quarter is a hotbed of activity, mostly shops, but also restaurants and coffee shops.  The prospect of a coffee balcony was too good to pass!  No, not a balcony made of a coffee, but rather one to sit on, watching the world go by and drinking coffee.  As we passed through the room leading to the balcony, we realised this was actually the house of a family, which they have commercialised wonderfully!

Before we came out, dad had been advised not to drink anything with ice in it.  With hindsight, an iced coconut coffee wasn’t the best choice of beverage for him, but he proceeded to pick out every single cube and drop it onto a napkin. What a mess! 

The iced coffee went down well though.  My cocoa / hot chocolate a bit less though a was quite bitter and (non herbal) teas aren’t really that popular here. 😔 

At this point, it’s 5:50pm and dad remembered the train at train street was due to pass at 6pm.  Cue a mad rush to run 2km (a theoretically 17 minute journey) without any sense of direction (thanks Google maps and lack of roaming!)

I somehow made it only one minute late, and going by the assembled (expectant) crowd formed, hadn’t missed the train.  I had however lost both parents, who I’d last seen around 1km back down the road, and again with no roaming, had no way of getting in touch.  Thankfully they soon showed up!

The train, it turns out, was actually due roughly 6:20pm.  Those near misses I mentioned earlier have prompted a few safety measures.  The main one is that only customers of the bars are allowed front row seats, everyone is shoed away.  Having heard about this rule, I wasn’t going to take any chances, so sat down and ordered a Fanta!  (Side note, does anyone remember when Fantas were actually orange.  Here, they still are, and a vibrant luminous orange at that.  Taste great too!)

When the train showed up, it was about three times bigger than I expected and a whole load longer.  Everything had clearly been measured to perfection because the tables were no more than an inch away from the train as it past.  There were more than a few shocked reactions – including the Australian couple beside us.   “Look at the size of it” someone screamed.  Actually on second view, I think it was my mother.  

After that exhilarating experience, we had developed a taste for daredevil adrenaline.  There was only one thing in Hanoi which could top that – the futuristic lifts of the Peridot Grand Luxury Boutique hotel.  No this wasn’t where we were staying, but instead had succumbed to the words sky and bar.  

The sky bar itself wasn’t nearly as exciting as the lift, and we de-escalated the situation immediately.  We were joined by one randomer on the way down, who was already in the lift when we got in at the top, and stayed in when we disembarked at the bottom.  Either he had forgotten where he was, or was loving the lift more than I was!

Mum was now desperate for the loo, and I hatched a plan to head to the local market, where there would surely be one.  Alas there wasn’t that I could find, and the market was closing up, so didn’t get much of a chance to explore, but we did encounter the street containing all of Hanoi’s Christmas shops on the way there.  Mum was in her element!

Unfortunately my glitter phobia was tripping at this stage, the whole road was covered in the stuff!

Tired and mum still in need of a toilet, we headed back to our hotel and took the lazy way back (taxi).  The whole thing only cost a few quid.

If you think drivers are bad back home, I dare you to experience the roads of Hanoi by taxi.  Those drivers are a different breed!  And we made it in one piece.

For dinner it was the hotel’s one restaurant.  I’m a bit of a fussy eater abroad, so chose the safest thing on the menu – ‘chicken in peppered sauce’.  It was actually more of a chicken stir fry, and even though the chicken contained bones, it was resoundingly delicious.  

We were shocked to discover that the total (for three meals and drinks) came to £13.12.  The waiter insisted it was correct, but there is no way – it must have been a mistake!

Day 1 done and I absolutely love Vietnam!