Hanoi, Vietnam

After just over a year in Melbourne I've finally left the country again.

At the moment I'm sitting in the Little Hanoi Hotel in, well... Hanoi.

So far, Cam and I are absolutely loving it. The journey here pretty much completely sucked (except for the NZ wine on my flights) but it was certainly worth it. After about 30 hours of transit I was well and truly exhausted by the time I arrived. I met Cam at the hostel as he had the amazing opportunity to fly with Air Asia almost all the way here. Unlucky. Very unlucky.

We woke up this morning at the ripe hour of 6:30 and began our day at the same time most people normally do. Odd for me waking up before 10am. For brekky we decided to try pho bo, which is beef noodle soup. Something a little different to corn flakes but ten times as good. We ate at a streetside vendor and sat on the smallest chairs at the smallest table - ever. It was great! After that we made our way to Hoan Kiem lake which was beautiful, though the ph level of the water was questionable. From there we took a cyclo, which is a three-wheeled cycle with a seat for two on the front, to the Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum complex. Unfortunately for us it's closed on Mondays - great. But regardless of that, it looked pretty impressive from the outside.

After that we headed to the Temple of Literature. A Confucian temple built around 1000 years ago. I'll be posting photos on facebook soon but cbf at the moment. Needless to say, it was sensational!

For lunch we ate at Koto. It's a good cause restaurant that hires young Vietnamese people and trains them up to work in the hospitality industry. It was good to know our money was going to a good cause!

From there we decided to walk back to our hostel, getting pretty lost on the way. It didn't really matter though because it was worth it for the sights we saw on the way. The streets here are bustling and motorbikes rule the roads. It's pretty crazy and horns are honking constantly making crossing the road pretty interesting. We took a great video of the traffic which I'll post at some stage. Maybe. Let's be honest, probably won't get around to doing it - takes way too long.

We came back to our hostel and had a nap mid-afternoon and have just gotten back from dinner. We decided to try Cha Ca, which is a traditional fried fish dish. They brought a pan over to the table and it basically cooked in front of us. We were given a few bowls with vermicelli, lemongrass, kaffir lime leaves, peanuts, chilli and fish sauce in them and a huge bowl full of spring onion and dill. The waiter made it at the table for us, it was pretty obvious we had no idea what we were doing. She threw the dill and spring onion into the pan with the fish and filled our bowls with the other ingredients. They were then combined to create the *BEST MEAL EVER*. It was unanimous, both Cam and I decided it was one of the best things we'd ever eaten, ever, in the world, of all time. Yum!

Off to Ha Long bay tomorrow and really looking forward to it.