Tag Archives: halong bay
Halong Bay
Halong Bay is one of the main tourist attractions in Vietnam – it’s the image of the country that you see in the Jetstar ads. Its famous as it’s world heritage listed for the 2000 or so islands that surround the bay. We booked our tour in Hanoi with Handspan travel and left the city at around 8am. It’s a 3hour drive to the bay so you need to make sure you book a tour with a company that has decent transport – especially air-con. Along the way you get to see some of the amazing vietnamese countryside – the paddy fields, the small villages and of course thousands of motorbikes. As it was the weekend Halong Bat was packed with tourists, mainly americans. The harbour contained about 25 to 30 boats and everyone of them was sailing that day. If you prefer the quiet, then a weekday trip would probably be better. We had only booked a day trip as we were short on time but the best thing is to probably book a trip where you spend a night or two on the boat. Continue reading
Hanoi
Hanoi, the capital city of Vietnam, is absolutely chaotic. A great introduction back into south-east asia but it did test my stress levels. We flew from Tokyo to Seoul and then got a connecting flight to Hanoi. First off, this was a terrible flight. The korean airlines plane was tiny, there was no leg room and the food was shockingly bad. We got into Hanoi at around 10:30 pm and got our visas at immigration. We had accommodation booked in the Old Quarter and they had emailed me to say that they were sending a driver to pick us up at the airport for free. This would help us to avoid all the touts and scams at the airport that try and lure you into another hotel. I wasn’t anticipating any issues with this arrangement but i was wrong. Continue reading