HANOI

1st - 4th August 2015

We successfully arrived in Hanoi bright and early after another breakneck night bus ride. We had heard that a night bus had crashed on route to pick up at Phong Nha (luckily not ours), this was not the most comforting thought as we tucked ourselves in for the night.

To avoid the taxi Mafia at the bus station we walked a couple of blocks looking for coffee and accidentally became the first ever customers of the Nhac Cafe that just opened that morning. It was a trendy little place with a massive vinyl collection, we fired up the record player with the Beatles White Album. With a caffeine kick we went in search of a room. 

It took a while as everywhere was full but eventually we found a room on the edge of the old town, with breakfast and free beer between 7-8pm. As soon as we checked in it started raining, the clouds looked perfectly comfortable where they were and showed no signs of moving, fluffy bastards. 

We were both feeling pretty drained from the trek and the night bus so we opted for a day of coffee shop hopping to recharge and avoid the monsoon. We splashed our way over to the Hanoi Social Club, a cool little cafe in a crumbly old French building. We accidentally spent most of the afternoon there as the giant burgers we ordered nearly killed us and required a large amount of post burger sitting. 

The rain still poured so we eventually changed location to another cafe called Kafe. A nice place with really good coffee and chocolate truffles. Evening was on its way so we went back to the hostel for a couple of free beers with the other guests. Our plan was to get some tips about visiting Halong Bay. Unfortunately a series of typhoons had been battering the north coast sadly catching out a number of locals and tourists. This meant all trips had been canceled for the last ten days. This was a massive shame as Halong Bay was going to be Vietnams headline act. Most of the people there had just arrived and were heading south and were really interested to hear where we had been. Like a preacher we told of our stories of travelling up the coast, sharing our new found knowledge with the masses. One lad said I looked like Jesus which really added to the scene. I blessed him before we left. 

We finished the night with a beer on the pavement outside Cong Cafe, a communist / militant themed place. It was nice sitting with the locals watching the world go by, however they all drink coffee late into the night rather than a cold beer. This was one moment when the term "when in Rome" was ignored.  

The following morning brought more rain. So we thought lets do something museumy, cultural and more importantly dry. The body of the Communist leader Ho Chi Minh has been embalmed and preserved since his death in '69. You can visit him in a grand marble mausoleum near by the house and grounds he lived and worked in whilst leading the North and eventually the whole country. It was an eerie place. Being the weekend hundreds of locals had made the pilgrimage to come and pay their respects. In the middle of a vast marble tomb in a large ominous glass sarcophagus Uncle Ho (as the locals call him) lay very peaceful and looking almost as plastic as Simon Cowell. 

After saying good bye to Uncle Ho we had a look round his house and garage the house was simple and basic as you would expect but the car garage didn't quite portray the everybody is equal vision we were expecting of a great communist leader.

 It was still pissing it down so we went to check out his museum. It was in a mighty concrete communist block with a massive carved hammer and sickle above the entrance. Unfortunately the building was ten million times better that its contents which was a real let down. We hardly learnt anything and the main exhibits looked as though they had been put together by an artist rather than a historian, and a bad one at that. Nothing made any sense so we cut our visit short and walked over to a near by lake. 

The rain was still pissing down so we decided to give up trying to see the city and went to the cinema to watch Ted2. It was actually pretty funny and nice to have a few home comforts.

The rain let off a little in the afternoon so we downloaded a walking tour of the old town and got lost in its web of small streets and alleys. The smells of all the street food stalls, the unusual - often massive objects balanced on bikes, the crazy Asian fashion and the general hustle and bustle created a lively atmosphere that you could just sit and watch for hours. So that's exactly what we did. There is a local tradition in this city for drinking Bia Hoi. It's cheap home brewed beer served in little pavement cafes for about 15p a glass. It's not the best beer but it's a very good price especially when you can sit in the middle of all the chaos and quietly take it all in. As it neared eleven o'clock the little street bars began to empty very quickly. Chairs and tables were hurriedly being stacked up and dragged away. We were not sure why the sudden rush, then a rickety little lorry came round the corner with a few police officers in the back. The owner of the place we were sitting hurriedly hopped over grinning, patted one of the officers on the back and they "shook" hands. It must have been a very good handshake as the officer smiled and carried on down the street. Within about ten mins though the whole street and crossroads had gone from being a hive of drinking, chatting and laughing back to a sleepy collection of closed shutters and quiet side streets. 

The next day we were both feeling pretty ill. The rain was dribbling from above, Helen was dribbling from her nose and I was... Well let's just say I had a stomach bug. We both had been feeling a bit ropy for the last few days but now whatever we had was in full swing. We had a big lie in and a late breakfast in Joma Cafe, a pretty western place with the western price tag, but the food was good, as was the coffee. Plus when you're feeling a bit down and ill, a few home comforts go a long way. Especially when the comforts come in the form of a full English breakfast. 

As it was still raining we decided to search out a new little cafe at the top of an old block near the lakeside. It was down a dark alley between two shops, and up a gloomy staircase. At the top we were greeted by a bright homemade looking cafe with a view over to the lake. We sat and had a couple of Vietnamese iced coffees. We have been having these the whole trip and made a mental note to buy a couple of the metals drip filters for our future van in Australia.

There is a small temple on an island in middle of the lake. As the rain had lightened a tad we though we would loin the tourist crowd, pose of a pic on the bridge, and potter around the temple. It was a quaint little place dedicated to the legend of a golden turtle, that I can't quite remember and didn't really understand at the time. Either way a nice spot with some turtle statues knocking about. 

We read that there was another cafe near by that served one of Hanoi's best egg coffees. It was called Ca Phe Pho Co and too was entered through a dark alley off a side street, sandwiched in a gap between two buildings. Once you climbed the spiral staircase to the top, the view over the lake was amazing and surprisingly so was the egg coffee. Egg yolks are whisked with condensed milk and a spoon full of brewed coffee. The resulting fluffy foam is floated on top of a Vietnamese drip coffee. It was like a coffee and dessert all in one. It was such a great little spot we sat there for a few hours watching the world zoom by below, we also had a long catch up with Tommy on the blower which was nice.

We googled a descent Vietnamese restaurant for dinner, my iron stomach was still more like a paper one and I didn't want to run the street food gamble. On route we bumped into A couple of Aussies we met whilst staying on An Bhin island in the Mekong delta. It was nice to see a familiar face so we shared a quick beer with them in a little bar called Nola which seemed to occupy a little labyrinth of alleys, spaces and levels at the back of a number of buildings. We ate in a traditional Vietnamese place called Orchid balanced above a little secondhand book shop just round the corner. It had had great reviews and we could see why as the food was excellent. Fresh spring rolls, a Vietnamese salad, and a tasty rice dish left us feeling dozy and content.

Before heading back to the hostel we went for a quick Bia Hoi. We bumped into The Aussie couple again, one became two, then three. As eleven o'clock came, we watched eagerly as the game of cat and mouse with the police began again. Within seconds our beers were in plastic glasses, the tables and stools were gone and our once lively corner was empty. We headed up a near by lively street but it too was racing to pack up. The night ended in a Communist propaganda poster shop where the savvy owner let us have a seat and a few beers whilst watching the hustle and bustle.

We rose fairly early on day four. We had decided if it was raining we were going back to the cinema to watch The Minions. We were in luck ! It was. On the way we swung by "The Original Kangaroo Cafe" where the slightly paranoid Aussie owner seemed let's say a tad angry with all the other copy cats opening cafe / tour companies with the same name, piggybacking off his success. It looked promising that they might start running Halong Bay trips again as the weather was looking better on the coast. We would find out at 8am the next morning if the government had given the Halong boats the all clear.

Minions was awesome and afterwards the weather had bucked up. We walked back leisurely stopping off for Com Ga (chicken and rice) at a road side place and a coffee at No.58. Helen ordered a green tea and ended up with a bright green thick drink. Not sure where we went wrong there, but the coffee was good and the cafe was pretty trendy place with white brick, concrete and industrial features.

In the afternoon / evening we decided to visit the Bia Hoi corner one last time. This time Anna, a Spanish lady we met on the boat trip on Kho Rong island in Cambodia appeared out of the mayhem. We had a beer then went to a side road place for food. Feeling adventurous I ordered sweet and sour frog. It tasted bloody amazing, like chicken but better quality than the chicken we had eaten here. We returned to Bia Hoi corner one last time to watch the flurry of plastic furniture and smiley handshakes as well as an army of boozing Minions. Then it was off to bed ready for the early bus East to Halong Bay.