Hanoi and Halong Bay

Hello all,

Apologies for any typos...keyboard is bad, can't see letters and they stick!

Spent 3 days in Hanoi. The city was buzzing, it appears each street is dedicated to one type of good, there is shoe street, cabinet street, christmas shop street, you name it there is a street full of that product crammed into many 2m wide x 5m long shops! I checked out the water puppet shows, I saw an embalmed tortiose and of course the dead body of Ho Chi Minh! He looked very white! I also went to the womens museum. It showed the emancipation of women in Vietnam, how they were involved in the war, tribal dress, politics and then modern day life including being involved in miss world!

By the third day i had mastered the traffic and felt safe enough to get in a cyclo (rickshaw type thing you sit in attached to a man on a bike). Being among all the traffic was one hell of an experience.

We sailed on a boat from Hanoi to Halong Bay on the 10th December. The first day we just took in the sights of Halong bay and was taken to 'surprise amazing caves' after our lunch on board. The guide was hilarious and had watched far too much western films as he used phrases such as bloody bastard tortoise! to describe some of the myths of the caves. The caves were amazing, really vast and beautiful. We sailed on and then taken to Cat Ba. We should have stayed on the boat but were told we were staying in the hotel...hot water, clean warm beds (as it is freezing here, well our summer, i was in a hoodie) TV, fridge, i'm not complaining! We assumed we would spend the 2nd night on the boat. Ended up in an irish bar with karoke and lots of sweedish travellers. Interesting but fun after a several tiger beers.

2nd day we had to be up for breakfast at 7.30. It soon became apparent that we weren't going to be on the boat tonight but will stay in the hotel. I went on a trek at 8.30am in the Cat Ba national park (i know what is wrong with me!) which was more like a mountain climb. Saw some beautful sights and worked off a few pounds. I could have gone Kayaking to Monkey Island but due to the weather i decided to save watersports until the Thai Islands when the sun will hopefully be out! Emily and Lucy went and saw the Monkeys attack a guy...nice! I just wandered around in arvo, saw street life including markets and played pool of all things with an american guy and two german girls. The evening was spent in the irish bar again with a few tigers. We checked out the local disco but due to its emptiness decided against it!

On the third day we got back on the boat for 3 hours sailing around the other side of Halong bay.It was still lovely through the mist and fog, seeing all the fishing boats and spectacular limestone rocks, larger on this side of the bay. For the last 15 mins of our cruise the sun came out and the true beauty of Halong ba could be seen.

So now I am in Ninh binh, north of Vietnam. We decided to get a bus straight from Hanoi last night.I am in an internet cafe surrounded by kids playing computer games in a very narrow dirty room (not really a cafe). We are going to tam coc tomorrow where we see paddy fields, go on a river boat and see small villages. We guess that here is just a place to stop off to see tam coc as it is a dirty little town! No restaurants or anything! Have just had vietnamese tea with some locals which was cool, talking about their travels...it is all very random! Have spend the afternon wandering around. Took photos of the children at school, they got so excited to see me and loved me showing them the photos i took of them! You could feel like a celebrity walking around as everyone says hello and waves... in 3 hours i only saw two other westerners! I went to the market area where i saw snakes being gutted and frogs in cages! They eat everything here! Haven't seen any dog as yet...well not that i know of anyway!

So all is well, will be in Nah trang for christmas which is on the coast of south eastern vietnam. Have booked a nice hotel and are promised lovely beaches and plenty of places to eat, drink and be merry in. Still won't be the same. Trying not to think about it and gutted on missing out on all the xmas parties! Have fun at all the parties and please someone have a red wine for me...or some mulled wine!

Will be in Ho Chi Minh city for new year we think, should be good. Told there is lots of parties for the NY.

Thats all from me at the mo. Hope all are well and i have one last thing to say....

....Merry Christmas!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

T xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx