Vietnam, so far

I'm not sure what I expected from Hanoi, but this certainly wasn't it. This place is crazy! It's like it has been overtaken by gangs of people (every man, woman, and child) on motorbikes. I've never seen anything like it and you can't possibly imagine it without seeing it for yourself. We were told before we came that in order to cross the street in Hanoi, and apparently Saigon as well, you just need to walk. So that's what we do, mostly with our eyes closed. We have learned that we must look out for cars, but the bikes will look out for us. You cannot stop or hesitate as that causes more confusion and the bikes don't know which way to go to get around you. So far things have worked out well for us.

Hanoi is much closer to the China I know than Hong Kong. It's sort of dirty, there are a ton of people in a very small space, the streets are lined with all sorts of different shops selling anything you can imagine and there are tons of places to eat on the street. They even have meat on a stick! However, most people that we have come across here are very nice and they speak English. Definitely a change from Yantai. We spent our first night just wandering around the city. We felt an immense sense of pride that we were able to leave our hotel, wander around the city, eat, and find our way back. That seemed like enough for one evening. Our hotel is really nice and the people here are the most accomodating I think I've ever come across. For $55 a night we have a great room, a great staff and a full breakfast menu. They have helped us book everything we need from entertainment to hotel rooms elsewhere. Awesome.

The past 2 days we left Hanoi and went to Halong Bay, a 3.5 hour drive away. The drive was fine, we passed a lot of of paddies and small towns and "restaurants" specializing in dog (thit cho - which we were sure to memorize in Vietnamese before setting out). Halong Bay is absolutely beautiful. We lounged, ate, drank, kayaked, and saw a cave. We spent the night on the boat and then left there today around noon.

Once back at our hotel, we dropped our stuff and were off to do a little more roaming around the city. Unfortunately, by the time we made in back to the hotel, most of the touristy stuff had closed. And since we are leaving tomorrow morning, we won't get a chance to see it. We did see the One Pillar Pagoda and the outside of the Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum. Good enough. We've decided that since we only have a few days in each city and we're doing so much traveling that we weren't going to pressure ourselves to see everything in the city. We're pretty content just seeing a couple things and moving on. We also saw this water puppet show that was a bit odd and a bit cool.

So far vacation has been amazing - all 4 days of it! Missy is a really easy person to travel with as neither of us has a set itinerary, we're both happy to do whatever or nothing and are both flexible, understanding that not everything goes according to plan, which is sometimes better anyway. After my past few months in Yantai I have learned immense amounts of patience and flexibility.

We leave tomorrow to take a plane to Danang and from there a short(ish) taxi ride to Hoi An which is supposed to be beautiful. Very excited, and right now, very tired.