Travelling Vietnam North to South
As we are travelling Vietnam during their winter months we felt very at home when we landed in Hanoi to dark rainy air, however still around 20degrees so not all that bad really. We later realised that as soon as you head out of the city the cloud and fog clears and becomes much brighter. Hanoi international airport is around an hours drive into the Old quarter city centre.
I have to tell you about our hostel here in Hanoi (we know hostels aren’t for everyone) which was more like a hotel. The Little Charm Hostel Hanoi has a 24 hour reception, tour operators, a reasonably priced Italian restaurant, an indoor heated swimming pool, fresh towels, hot and powerful showers and many more luxuries that we’ve missed along our backpacking route and all for only £6 per night in a mixed 6 bed dorm. If you haven’t tried hostelling yet, somewhere like this would be a good break-in.
Exploring the Old Quarter
Take yourself to Ga Long Bien station and walk along Longbien
Bridge noticing the recognisable architecture of the bridge which was designed
by the same architect as the Eiffel tower. This bridge has a train track
running through it and bike routes either way, taking you all the way to the
city of Hue. Not one for the fainthearted, it’s a tad wobbly especially when
the train goes by.Of course we made our way to the infamous train street. You would have seen photos, I’m sure, of people walking across the tracks getting their Instagram perfect photo amongst the hustle and bustle of the shops and cafes that lie right on the edge of the track. Unfortunately several cafes and bars were opening up without a license and the government have blocked the street off and the train only runs on a few days now. You can still get your photo but it’s definitely a trick of photography as you can’t really get onto the track anymore.
We took ourselves for a walk around the Old quarter to the main sights of Hanoi and found ourselves at the Hoan Kiem Lake which you can walk around in about 20 minutes, you can pay £1 to cross the small bridge into the middle of lake to see the small temple which is very pretty and filled with tourists and worshipers alike. The Lake itself I would say isn’t that spectacular but is a nice walk round and a great running route if you’re in needed of some exercise. Next stop was St Josephs Cathedral, a beautiful cathedral that reminded me very much of Notre Dame in Paris, Beautiful Gothic architecture with an enormous Christmas tree and nativity scene out the front at Christmas time. Naturally, as per everywhere in Asia, we headed to the night market (Only Fri, Sat, Sundays from 6:30pm) selling ‘same same but different’ designer gear for nothing at all and street food that will make you want to come back for more. Our last stop in Hanoi was the Water Puppet show, costing only £4 to attend a show lasting about an hour, the puppeteers give an insight to Vietnam history with traditional music played along side the water stage. I’ll let you decide if its worth the trip or not.
Exploring the famous Islets of Ha Long
Ha Long Bay is possibly one of the most famous places
tourists try to head to in Vietnam and that’s why tourist boats are no longer
allowed to drop anchor for the night anymore due to polution of the water and
over population. Instead we cruised around Lan Ha bay (dropping into Ha Long Bay
on route). Lan Ha Bay is home to one of the biggest floating village
communities in Vietnam. People stay on their floating homes to farm fish and of
course, for tourism. We hopped onto one of the floating settlements to take
their kayaks out for a tour around the islets at a more intimate level.
Paddling around the islands, under archways, into hidden caves and beaches was
truly magical and if you’re in a small group extremely peaceful. Along the way
you’ll be shown where many scenes from famous Hollywood films such as James
bond and King Kong were filmed.We hopped off our boat every now and then to explore. We took a short cycle ride through Cat Ba island to find a small village called Viet Hai, famous for its pearls, rice wine and homestays. Home to around 30 families it really was beautiful and like stepping into another world with no cars, only bikes and walking as a means of transport. We also took our kayaks to monkey beach where you could take a walk up to a view point and look over the bay or just sit in the café and enjoy the monkeys terrorising the tourists.
We decided a 2 night 3 day tour would be a great amount of time for us around Lan Ha bay, and we were right, 1 night wouldn’t have been enough to enjoy this remarkable place. We stayed on a cruise (more like a pirate ship) that had 5 bedrooms, a dining table for all guests to sit for family dinner and lounge chairs to enjoy the sun and views from. Each night we would moor up in the ‘sleeping area’ of the bay and try our hand at making Nem (spring rolls) in a short cooking class and squid fishing. We were very unsuccessful at this but we came close and was definitely entertaining to give it a go. Of course during the day jumping from the highest point of the boat into the water was a huge must do challenge and once facing that fear and landing successfully in the water it was so refreshing it was hard to get out! There were steps – don’t panic!
For our Vietnam trip we purchased an open bus ticket which allowed us to stop in 5 different destinations (you can pay for more stops) and pick and chose when we left each city. So from Hanoi we caught our first overnight bus to Hue.
The Imperial City
We only spent 2 nights here in Hue and that was plenty. We set out on our first full day to the old Citadel, The Imperial City built in 1803 in the Nguyen dynasty. It costs around £5 to enter the old city and you can spend as much time there as you please. You could spend all day here exploring the hidden gardens and old parts of the city buildings. It is truly magical and if you use your imagination (and help from some videos around the site) you can really picture what if used to be like way back then.
We made some other quick pit stops in Hue including Thien Mu Pagoda and The Royal Tomb of Khai Dinh King, both uniquely beautiful in their own right. However you don’t need long here and it is extremely busy filled with tourists on the same route of the city. The last site we explored, and I had been excited to see since the beginning of our travels, was the old abandoned water park. The park is closed to everyone and there are guards turning you away at every entrance point which at first was very disappointing. We then looked a little closer and there was loads of people inside the park, so as encouraged by our wonderful host at our hostel its best to just walk in as the guards cannot turn you away. So, on that, we did! And it truly is the most haunting place, with old dragon statues, winding staircases and a few old slides. Its quite magical, so take the plunge and experience it for yourselves.
Biking the Hai Van Pass
Our next adventure was travelling the Hai Van Pass on the back of motorbikes. We used Easy Riders who are a very prestigious company throughout Asia, you can hire a bike yourself or, like us, hop on the back of an experienced riders bike with your luggage strapped to the back.
The city of lights.
What can I say about HoiAn? The lanterns, the rivers, the people and the food were all just what I’d ever dreamt of! The City of lights is famously known for its lanterns and it did not disappoint. At night time the city streets are lined with lanterns hanging and shops selling their treasured lanterns. Street stalls selling candles and paper baskets for you to make a wish and see your lantern float away down the river were on every corner. We chose not to take part in this as the river was slowly building up with left over paper and candles leaving a horrid eye sore on such a beautiful city. We took part in a lantern making class for a very reasonable price where you see and learn how to make a lantern from start to finish.
We took a very short taxi ride to The coconut village to
take a trip round the village in a traditional bamboo boat that I had read so
much about. The boats themselves were wonderful unfortunately the experience
was slightly tainted by the amount of tourists and the locals playing up to it
by booming out karaoke music all in a quest to get tips. I would definitely
recommend giving the boats a go but do not have high expectations of a peaceful
boat ride as you will be bitterly disappointed.Beach time
We arrived in Nha Trang in the early hours of the morning after another long sleeper bus (there are of course flights and trains if you don’t want to endure these long buses). Nha Trang is renowned for its beautiful beaches which after a while of exploring cities with not much rest was welcomed with open arms. If you are a sea swimmer just be warned the waves and the rip on Nha Trang beach are extremely strong and even as a strong swimmer I was tugged and bashed around so didn’t spend long in the water. Please take notice to the danger flags on the beach and if you are not a strong swimmer I would recommend maybe just a paddle. Nha Trang has now become a place for Russian tourist to come and this is noticed as soon as you arrive in the city, with signage, menus, supermarkets all in Russian or with Russian influences. Many Locals would no longer talk to or smile at us which was such a shame, but as soon as we started speaking to them soon enough those Vietnamese smiles came running back.
One of the main reasons we came to Nha Trang was to go to VinPearl Land (the inner children in us). Vin Pearl Land is an amusement park with a water park, seaside water sports including inflatable assault course, theme park, giant wheel, animal park, gardens and cable car to get you to the island.
Be warned the queues to get to the island via cable car are endless, we ended up taking a speed boat which got us there much quicker and avoided the queues. We started in the water park, not all the rides were open as some were closed for maintenance but the others that were open were great with minimal queues. The beach here at Vin Pearl was glorious and the seas so calm in complete contrast to the mainland. We spent most of the morning in the water park then we made our way up to the big Ferris wheel and animal park filled with animals that don’t necessarily belong on an Asian island and don’t look incredibly well looked after. Naturally we moved on from here quite quickly towards the amusement park with a few thrill seeker rides and some more tame rides for those less interested in being thrown upside down. If you’re one of those amusement park people that will happily queue for hours for that perfect ride then get comfy for the new ‘alpine rollercoaster’ taking you to the top of VinPearl and riding down solo on a toboggan style cart, we decided to give this a miss as the queue was so long. Their newest addition to the park is the zipline, again we missed this, as their system was to queue up for an hour and then they would essentially shuffle some cards and if you were 1 of the lucky 10 cards shuffled in you would get a chance to ride the zipline. Seemed a little strange to me.
Vin Pearl is very much the Disney of Vietnam albeit much smaller and less magical but they have done a great job here and even do a light and dancing water show and light up the magic castle at night before you head back to the cable car on your return journey back to the mainland.
VinPearl Land has its ups and downs like all theme parks do but as a day trip for adults and children alike it is well worth a visit.
The City of Lakes, Dalat.
Situated in the mountains a city build around these beautiful lakes has brought foreign and local tourists to visit. Dalat is also famous for its flowers and vegetables as you can see on entering the city with the endless fields of green houses, not a square foot of land is empty.
Take a cab to the South of the city for a cable car across
the scenic views of the mountains and fir trees taking you to the Truc Lam Zen
Monastery, one of the most well-known monastery’s in Vientam famous for being
extremely tranquil and zen. Spend as much time here as you like and take some
‘you time’. From here we took a walk about 20 minutes down the road to the
Alpine rollercoaster and Datanla waterfall. Finally we had our chance at going
on an Alpine rollercoaster and it was so much fun! Whipping and winding down
the hill however fast you please as the breaks are at your own control. The
waterfall at the bottom was also beautiful and you can chose to go canyoning
here as a day trip.
Dalat is home to one of the oldest railways stations and
tracks now only 8km of the track is usable and runs only a few times a day for
tourist to take a trip on the replica carriages to the Linh Phu Pagoda, a
beautiful pagoda made from recycled materials. The train will stop for around
half an hour before it returns back towards the city. If you’ve paid for a
return ticket be sure to get back with plenty of time as it will not wait for
you.A few days here in Dalat was lovely and I can see how people would spend longer as it’s a very calm place to be, exploring or just relaxing by the lake (even if slightly more expensive). Enjoy the relax time.
Lets go to the Beach….again.
From one chilled out place to another we moved onto Mui Ne. We stayed here for 4 nights right on the beach and didn’t stray too far from there for the majority of the time. It truly was fantastic. The small time we did spend off the beach was for the sun set at the sand dunes. At the White Dunes you can pay to use the quad bikes which now looking back I would have paid the small fortune they were asking for as it was an extremely long and hot walk to the top of the dunes. The Red dunes, where we ended up for the sunset, were packed with tourist and in my opinion a lot less beautiful than the white. But still a great place to watch the sun go down.
There’s plenty of places to get local food here in Mui Ne, we found a great food court that had seating in the middle and around 20 different varieties of food and drink restaurants surrounding you to chose from. We ate there most days.
Our final stop.
Our final stop in Vietnam was the Capital City of Ho Chi Minh City, still known to most as Saigon. We spent as little time as here as possible to be honest it was your typical over-crowded, polluted dirty city. We really only stopped here for one reason. The Cu Chi Tunnels. Dug in the 1940s by soldiers to store weapons and hide from the enemy this site has now been taken over by large tourists groups. Its my understanding that a few years back it was a great site to see and you really experienced the nature of these tunnels. However when we went this time round we were in an extremely large tour group (only tours go there, no taxis’s) where we were rushed round the site with a very quick stop if you chose to go into the tunnels and then spent most of our time waiting for our group to go in the firing range. The site is still run by the military and they have worked out that charging people to shoot some rifles or automatic weapons makes them heaps of money. Unfortunately this now seems to be the main attraction not the history of the tunnels.
Good Night Vietnam!
And so we end our trip in Vietnam. We spent roughly a month in this beautiful country and we could have happily spent another month exploring the hidden beauties of this country. As you can see by my number of photos going up on my blogs, there were so many to chose from in this part of our trip so I hope you enjoy them all! Just gives us an excuse to come back eh!?
Why not look into it? Drop us a message or pop into the office today and see if Vietnam is the place for you.
Keep Adventuring. Stay Blue.
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