So now i`m in a different country- Vietnam,and it`s rather different from Thailand! Our flight was delayed by nearlyan hour on Friday so we ended up landing just after 9pm in Hanoi. The flight was quite cool as we flew right above a storm and it was awesome seeing the lightning from the plane. I have to say our introduction to Hanoi was pretty much awful if i`m being honest. For starters it was raining so that didn`t bode well. We had booked a guesthouse over the internet and were told that we would be met at the airport with a sign. Turns out the guesthouse had never reveived our internet booking and therefore had not sent a car for us. There was however a man at the airport holding a sign with the name of our guesthouse- enter our con man.

To cut a very long story short we were conned out of 1.4million dong which is the equivalent of 45pounds. I know you`re all probably thinking `oh the idiots` and i honestly thought that after 16months on the road i was wise to these things. But i guess you can`t understand unless it has happened to you. We trusted the man because we assumed he was from the hotel, we were tired and trying to deal with a new currency that was confusing to us- only made worse by the con man trying to add the money up in a different way to confuse us more! As you can all imagine, i cried my eyes out when we got to the hotel and our taxi `receipt` was for just 200,000. And then you ask yourself a million what ifs and whys. I know 45pounds doesn`t seem like much but over here it`s so much money but it was more the anger of having been cheated and not realising soon enough to do anything about it. I felt completely stupid. So our first night in Hanoi really didn`t start off well!

The next morning we set off in search of a travel agent to book a boat tour around Halong Bayand also to sort out a bus ticket to get us down the country. Pretty sure a bus isn`t the most comfortable option of travelling such distances but it`s certainly the cheapest. After sorting that out we decided to be cultural and visit the Museum Of Ethnology. Enter scenario two of Kathryn not liking Hanoi too much! The lady at our hotel, and the guidebook, said the museum was 6-7km away so should cost around 50,000dong. Our delightful driver decidedto take the `scenic` route which added up to 11km and 86,000dong instead. After putting up an argument and getting nowhere (none of them seem to speak english, or maybe it`s just more convenient not to!) a 100,000 note was handed over. At which point the driver decides he conveniently does not have the correct change. By this point i am slightly exasperated and beginning to be a little angry/rude towards the driver so i refuse to exit the car while still arguing with him. This seemsto anger mr. taxi driver even more so he starts ranting at me in vietnamese which in turn angers me even more! In the end i stomp off angrily demanding to know why all vietnamese taxi drivers are money grabbing bastards!

Anyway i suppose i should stop ranting and tell you a bit about what we have actually done in Hanoi. The Museum of Ethnology basically explores Vietnam`s cultural diversity with a large collection of art and everyday objects. The grounds surrounding the museum also held many exhibits such as traditional houses, one of which was 43metres long! After deciding that i hated all taxi drivers we decided to try a ride on a motorcycle where you agree on the price first. It was mental, and was more fun than sitting in the back of a car. When people say there are generally 6 lanes of traffic to one road they aren`t axaggerating, and the noise from the horns is unbelievable! Apparently the only realroad rule is that small yields to big and vehicles (usually) drive on the right. There are literally bikes going in all directions but as all the guidebooks say, there are hardly ever any accidents, they just all weave around each other. It was definitelyan experience. 

In the evening we took a walk around Hoan Kiem Lake- the liquid heart of the Old Quarter. There is actually a temple on an island on the lake but it was closed when we got there. As we walked around the lake we stumbled across several aerobics classes which i thought was rather cool. After dinner we bought tickets to a water puppetry show and even though we didn`t really understand it,it was still quite amusing and very popular anyway. 

The next morning we made sure we were up in time to visit the Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum complex- the final resting place of Ho Chi Minh despite the fact that he requested to be cremated! However, it didn`t matter that we were up in time as our two motorcycle taxis managed to lose each other (they were waiting at different entrances) so we both ended up being driven around Hanoi for half an hour thus arriving at the complex after it was closed! After that we decided to go to the Ho Chi Minh museum where the cheeky buggers gladly accepted our admission fee and then proceeded to close the museum 5minutes later!

Next we thought we would try our luck at the Temple of Literature. The building was established as a university for the education of mandarins in the 11th century and is a well-preserved jewel of traditional vietnamese architecture. To complete our day of sight seeing we visited Hoa Lo Prison museum in the afternoon. The Hoa Lo Prison was nicknamed the `hanoi hilton` by US POWs during the war. Most of the exhibits focused on the vietnamese struggle for independence from France. After that we felt like we had pretty much exhausted most of Hanois` major attractions so headed nack to our hotel to rest our weary feet and pack for Halong Bay.

All in all we both have mixed feelings on Hanoi and the people and we have spoken to other travellers who feel the same. They just don`t seem to smile as much as the Thai`s and the food is certainly not up to thai standards! But just as the guidebook describes... `it`s mad, it`s loud, it`s a little overwhelming, but....you`ll get used to it`!