While Hanoi is the captial, at about half the size of Saigon / HCMC, it's less frantic, less polluted and by degrees more relaxing; the forty-something, to the brash wide boy of Saigon. Although the love affair with the scooter is alive and well, there are slightly less of the brutes to wade through when you cross the road. For the keen readers of the blog (back to work you slackers) we have established there are at least three regional slang names for scooter, as well as their proper name and the major brands names which are widely used, so it turns out they are well on the way to Eskimo snow status.
There are some great Hanoi myths and mythologies in the making, the top attraction is the temple dedicated to the C14th warrior hero whose sword was swallowed by a large golden turtle in Hoan Kiem Lake (you have to love that). There is the temple in the middle of the lake and there to the left is a very large stuffed turtle (2.5ft by 4ft) which was fished out of the lake in the 70's (probably killed by the Americans), and now resides in airconditioned perpertuatity.
Having done the temples and the shops, we decided two days on a boat was required, so off to Ha Long Bay. Ha Long Bay is Bond film stuff, if 'the man with the golden gun' wasn't filmed here, my name is Nick Nack. It's got two thousand, to quote the guide 'monolithic', limestone islands. It's famous for great climbing and great falling off (you fall into the sea) and we even saw the monkeys which pester the climbers. We had top food, good weather, Australians and Mancunians for company and plenty of entertainment generated by the need to get round the ludicrous corkage charge on the boat.
We only have one appointment to keep before April and to make it we're catching a flight to Laos tomorrow, to crash Nicky and Lawrie's honeymoon. Why not.
Finally on a mundane note, why Han Oi? It turns out that while the Vietnamse now use a Roman script, they spent a good thousand years with Chinese symbols and a syllable script, so Vietnam is actually Viet Nam and Hanoi is Han Oi, a top bit of info to discover on your last day in a country.
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