Hanoi, Vietnam
Located in Northern Vietnam, Hanoi is one place to go too – simply for one reason: You can find one of the world heritage sites there! Yeah..Halong Bay.
To begin with, there are numerous guesthouses or 2-3 stars hotels in Hanoi especially within Old Quarter area. Choices of 5 stars hotels such as Sheraton or Sofitel Plaza are also available and you can take a 5-8 minutes taxi ride to Old Quarter. My personal experience at Sofitel Plaza (5 stars) and Hanoi Elegance 4(3 stars) are both great. Hanoi Elegance chain consists of 4 hotels in the Old Quarter area. Standard room is about US$45 and they even offer a desktop with free internet access in the room. Amenities in the room are great too. The only exception is the size of the room. Good value for money and good location. Hanoi Elegance 4 is the newest chain anyway. (www.hanoielegancehotel.com).
Currencies used are “VND”(Dong) or “US” dollar. Conversion rate is about US$1 = $17,000VND. The huge notes are confusing enough for me. Easy estimated is $17,000VND = S$1.70 (since conversion rate is about S$1.70 = S$1). Hence $10,000VND = S$1. Hope this is much easier to understand!
Most famous local food is the rice noodle known as “Pho” (looks like thinner kway teow) where many stalls serve Pho Bo (Noodle Beef) or Pho Ga (Noodle chicken). Its great really, definitely a must during a Vietnam trip.
Old quarter is the one of the most popular place in Hanoi (besides Halong Bay of course) which consists of maze of 36 streets dated back to the 13th Century. There are different products sold in the shops of each street and you can simply find whatever you want in the Old Quarter. The stuffs which you can find range from souvenirs; shoes; bags; gifts; toys; metal ware, art galleries; musical instruments; baskets; poultry and most amazingly, tomb-shops. You had to scrutinize each of the streets carefully to discover how amazing the streets are. Of course, you have to endure the continuous honking of the numerous motor-bikes and taxi as well as touting which ‘haunt’ the street. Beware of the motor-bikes while shopping and browsing through items on the narrow streets, they are everywhere! There is a wholesale market within Old Quarter if you walk in deep enough but there is nothing much except you can purchase caps; accessories; tee-shirts in bulk.
Estimated time to discover the entire Old Quarter is about 8 hours. I got lost in Old Quarters for about 6 hours and repeated few streets at times. I went back the next day and discovered new streets and I wondered about 3 hours. Exhausting and tiring excursion but worth the experience I would say. Also, do not expect to buy many things from there too and there is no foot massage service in the main streets (you can still find 3-4 in certain isolated areas but they are close to being empty and most will not want to step in).
Another advise before going to Old Quarter is to fill up with stomach first as there are few cafes found especially in the maze. Walk into one immediately if needed when you see it as it is almost impossible to find back the same cafe after walking two streets away. You could find many local stalls by the roadside though, try it if you are feeling adventurous! I could not quite figure out what they offered there except Pho Bo (Beef Rice Noodle). There is a nice cafe known as “Little Hanoi” which serves local as well as western dishes along Ta Hien Street.
Go goggle “Old Quarter” if you wish to find out more about its history.
Within Old Quarter also lies the well-known Water Puppet Theatre. Tickets are priced at $60,000VND for 1st-class seats (Same type of chairs anyway but first few rows to the stage) and $40,000VND for 2nd-class seats. Each show lasts about 50 minutes and reserve your tickets in advance as they are often mass-reserved and purchased by tour groups. Shows starts at about 2.30pm and at every 1.5hour interval. Last show is at about 8pm. Visit its official website at http://www.thanglongwaterpuppet.org/ for more details on the show. Fun to watch if you wish to get a better understanding of the Vietnamese culture – they have different themes for each segment. Grab a brochure outside behind proceeding to understand the meaning of the show. Photo-taking is not allowed unless you pay an additional of $15,000VND and video-taking at $60,000VND. I am not sure on how they verify once in the huge theatre. I decided not to take the risk to stealing a shot though. Outside the theatre or around Old Quarter, you are able to find many wooden statues of these puppets (if you find them adorable).
Located in Northern Vietnam, Hanoi is one place to go too – simply for one reason: You can find one of the world heritage sites there! Yeah..Halong Bay.
To begin with, there are numerous guesthouses or 2-3 stars hotels in Hanoi especially within Old Quarter area. Choices of 5 stars hotels such as Sheraton or Sofitel Plaza are also available and you can take a 5-8 minutes taxi ride to Old Quarter. My personal experience at Sofitel Plaza (5 stars) and Hanoi Elegance 4(3 stars) are both great. Hanoi Elegance chain consists of 4 hotels in the Old Quarter area. Standard room is about US$45 and they even offer a desktop with free internet access in the room. Amenities in the room are great too. The only exception is the size of the room. Good value for money and good location. Hanoi Elegance 4 is the newest chain anyway. (www.hanoielegancehotel.com).
Currencies used are “VND”(Dong) or “US” dollar. Conversion rate is about US$1 = $17,000VND. The huge notes are confusing enough for me. Easy estimated is $17,000VND = S$1.70 (since conversion rate is about S$1.70 = S$1). Hence $10,000VND = S$1. Hope this is much easier to understand!
Most famous local food is the rice noodle known as “Pho” (looks like thinner kway teow) where many stalls serve Pho Bo (Noodle Beef) or Pho Ga (Noodle chicken). Its great really, definitely a must during a Vietnam trip.
Old quarter is the one of the most popular place in Hanoi (besides Halong Bay of course) which consists of maze of 36 streets dated back to the 13th Century. There are different products sold in the shops of each street and you can simply find whatever you want in the Old Quarter. The stuffs which you can find range from souvenirs; shoes; bags; gifts; toys; metal ware, art galleries; musical instruments; baskets; poultry and most amazingly, tomb-shops. You had to scrutinize each of the streets carefully to discover how amazing the streets are. Of course, you have to endure the continuous honking of the numerous motor-bikes and taxi as well as touting which ‘haunt’ the street. Beware of the motor-bikes while shopping and browsing through items on the narrow streets, they are everywhere! There is a wholesale market within Old Quarter if you walk in deep enough but there is nothing much except you can purchase caps; accessories; tee-shirts in bulk.
Estimated time to discover the entire Old Quarter is about 8 hours. I got lost in Old Quarters for about 6 hours and repeated few streets at times. I went back the next day and discovered new streets and I wondered about 3 hours. Exhausting and tiring excursion but worth the experience I would say. Also, do not expect to buy many things from there too and there is no foot massage service in the main streets (you can still find 3-4 in certain isolated areas but they are close to being empty and most will not want to step in).
Another advise before going to Old Quarter is to fill up with stomach first as there are few cafes found especially in the maze. Walk into one immediately if needed when you see it as it is almost impossible to find back the same cafe after walking two streets away. You could find many local stalls by the roadside though, try it if you are feeling adventurous! I could not quite figure out what they offered there except Pho Bo (Beef Rice Noodle). There is a nice cafe known as “Little Hanoi” which serves local as well as western dishes along Ta Hien Street.
Go goggle “Old Quarter” if you wish to find out more about its history.
Within Old Quarter also lies the well-known Water Puppet Theatre. Tickets are priced at $60,000VND for 1st-class seats (Same type of chairs anyway but first few rows to the stage) and $40,000VND for 2nd-class seats. Each show lasts about 50 minutes and reserve your tickets in advance as they are often mass-reserved and purchased by tour groups. Shows starts at about 2.30pm and at every 1.5hour interval. Last show is at about 8pm. Visit its official website at http://www.thanglongwaterpuppet.org/ for more details on the show. Fun to watch if you wish to get a better understanding of the Vietnamese culture – they have different themes for each segment. Grab a brochure outside behind proceeding to understand the meaning of the show. Photo-taking is not allowed unless you pay an additional of $15,000VND and video-taking at $60,000VND. I am not sure on how they verify once in the huge theatre. I decided not to take the risk to stealing a shot though. Outside the theatre or around Old Quarter, you are able to find many wooden statues of these puppets (if you find them adorable).
Near to Old Quarter is the famous Hoan Kiem Lake and the Ngoc San temple which is built in1843. The temple is surrounded by the beautiful lake. To get into the temple, you would need to pay an entrance fee of $10,000VND. Inside the temple, you can sit around to admire the magnificent scenery and visit the souvenir stalls found there. There is also a giant turtle replica to take note of (Ha, there is a legend behind this mystical turtle which is supposedly seen in Hoan Kiem Lake).
Coming to the most exciting part of Hanoi - Halong Bay which is one of the UNESCO heritage sites. I just read from UNESCO websites that there are 750 natural; cultural and mixed sites in the world under the World Heritage List! Do you know that? Seems that I have to travel more extensively and intensively! Halong Bay consists of spectacular limestone caves which are developed over 500 millions years through natural processes of erosion and weathering. Anyway, the ride from Hanoi to Halong Bay is about 3 hours with a 20 minutes stop along the way. Nice view of paddy fields and local streets on the way.
There are numerous grottoes and caves to be explored on the bay. The famous ones include Thien Cung and Dau Go Grotto which I have visited in my 1 day trip. Other famous grottoes are Trinh Nu and Trong grottoes. I would encourage everyone to go for the overnight cruise which allows you to explore more grottoes and some packages include swimming and kayaking. You can find many tourist agencies in Old Quarter which offers trips to Halong Bay where you can decide on the length of your trip. A highly recommended agency is Sinh Cafe, Hanoi which provides reliable and good-value packages. Unfortunately, there are many FAKE Sinh cafe around. In fact, you can see one or two Sinh cafe on the same street bearing the similar names & even logo. The best way is to reserve online or ensure that you find the right address to the REAL Sinh Cafe (www.sinhcafevn.com). However, I have to highlight that my trip reserved under Sinh Cafe was somehow taken over by another agency known as Khan Sinh. Fortunately, the trip was good and the tour guide is pretty knowledgeable and speaks good English. The reliability of Sinh Cafe is no doubt compromised too. An advice is to compare all prices and packages before booking your trip to Halong Bay. Some packages are costly depending on the boat or junk you are on. I paid about US$25 for my day trip only. There are packages under other agencies which cost more than US$80 for the same day trip and the itinerary is pretty similar. The package is inclusive of 2-way transfer between Hanoi & Halong Bay; meals on-board; and entrance to the caves. Drinks are excluded so get your drinks from the street stalls at the harbour before boarding. Stick close to your tour group as the harbour and ticket station is real crowded.
Last place of interest is the Temple of Literature, founded in 1070, which worships Confucius and other historical scholars. The temple consists of five courtyards which symbolize the elements of nature and lotus ponds. Few souvenirs shops are available and the popular product is the “lucky” pendant representing different virtues. Outside the temple is a popular cafe known as Pho24. You can find many outlets in Ho Chi Minh but apparently there seems to be only one in Hanoi. The outlet is rather small but they offer cheap and nice local food.
Other places of interest in Hanoi include Ho Chi Mihn Mausoleum; Hanoi Opera house and One Pillar Pagoda. Unfortunately, they are not on my agenda but they may interest you!=)
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