First thoughts on Hanoi...

Well, we made it. Firstly, can I say, flying overseas is not as glamorous as I thought it would be. The flights are sooo long, the seats uncomfortable, & poor Craig got a bout' of travel sickness on the plane that was not very nice. Add to this a 4 hour stop over at Bangkok Airport, which just happens to be about 50000kms long, and waiting an hour for our bags at Hanoi! Other than that, we are having many adventures...

Hanoi... I don't even know how to describe it. It is like it is switched on, all the time. The streets are insane. I actually don't know how we survived the transfer here. There are NO road rules, no indicating, and the streets are full of thousands of motorbikes as well as cars, buses, pushbikes etc. There is a constant hum of beeping that we can hear from our hotel room- my thoughts are that if my father was here, he would be on the next flight home already!! Its exciting though, every time you cross the road its as if you are risking your life- talk about an adrenalin rush!
The staff here at the hotel we are staying at are lovely. The Vietnamese staff are so kind and helpful, and the owners are Aussie which is nice considering how culture-shocked we are. The woman who runs the hotel suggested we go to this little noodle place down the road for lunch- it serves one dish, beef with rice noodles, lettuce, picked vegetables and a kind of sweet fruit dressing with peanuts. It was soooo delicious. The meal, plus a Hanoi Beer, cost us $3.50 each! Everything is so cheap- water for example (as you have to drink it bottled) is about 50 cents a litre. I got a cute pair of RayBans that look so real for $10...

The only problem we're having at the moment (besides our body clocks being four hours in front of time here, it is 5 and it feels like bed time!) is the constant hinderence of people trying to sell you stuff. So far we got talked into buying these bracelets for $1 each- they actually are quite nice, I am wearing one now... A green Vietnam hat for Craig for $4. We got a bit of a fright when this young boy on a motorbike literally followed us down the road for 15 mins trying to sell us a book! We did manage to knock him down from $20 to $6 and he threw in a free book of postcards... we did not need them though, we simply bought them for him to leave us alone. I think we need to master haggling and ignoring a lot better. It will be a challenge.

Looking forward to our overnight stay on a junk boat on Halong Bay tomorrow- hopefully it will be a bit of serenity after the chaos that is Hanoi. We are definately having a new experience here!!!

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I hope you are all not missing me too much already ;)
I am already missing my family terribly, I cried leaving my Mum & Dad at the airport. I might have my traveller face on at the moment, but I am definately an Australian homebody at heart.
Talk soon,
Lozz xx