Hanoi

Where: Hanoi is the capital city of Vietnam and is situated in the North of the country. How we did it: We did a tour of Vietnam from North to south summer 2007 with a company I found on the internet. www.selectiveasia.com and I dealt with a man called Nick who was extremely helpful all along the decision making and booking process. I organised my own flights to Bangkok then from Bangkok to Hanoi with an Asian airline again on the internet www.airasia.com but there may be others, it is worth searching around. The tour: We arrived late in Hanoi and we met by our guide Thuy (pronounced two ee) who was a delightful young man ...

Mr Hong's or Nam Phuong to give it it's proper name is a travellers cafe and guest house on Hang Be. It is not as modern as some other places in the city but very friendly with the owner's (Mr Hong)children running about. It is also cheap but the shared four person rooms are better than the singles. In the shared rooms you get a balcony 4 large beds, ceiling fan and a shower but a single room just has a bed and floor fan. Also the one I got wason the roof and three of the walls were just metal grills. But that all adds to the atmosphere. Mr Hong is known to be able to fix up most things for his guests from a visa to Laos to advice on the best bars. All in all ...

Hanoi is often the first taste of Vietnam that many tourists get and if you were to go by first impressions your stay there would probably be a short one. Hanoi is the capital of the north and can be a little overwhelming. The city is overrun by motorbikes which makes the task of crossing the road an arduous one. Add to this the thousands of touts flogging every product imaginable and you have a cocktail of noise and interruption. In saying all this it is hard not to love the place. For a city of 3,500,000 million people the pollution levels are nowhere on the scale of, say, Bangkok. Hoan Kiem lake in the middle of the Old Quarter (where most ...