Hanoi

I am loving this city! It is a perfect mix of old and new, lively and vibrant yet relaxed, welcoming to foreigners and tourists yet true to its character.

The experience started well with my journey into the city. I had been a bit nervous about riding into a big city on my bicycle, but the road system was amazing! On each side of the main road into the city there was a completely segreated one way road running parrellel for motorbikes, bicycles, and other slower moving traffic to use. Once in the city, all of the traffic was divided into lanes according to vehicle type with regular signs reminding everyone where they should be, which meant that anything large or going fast didn’t come anywhere near me. Additionally, in places such as big intersections where the traffic was very busy, the bicycle/motorbike lane was generally funnelled away from the traffic, to rejoin it once the traffic was less crazy. It was fantastic! I felt so safe the whole way and it was also really easy to navigate. (Incidentally I think the ‘good for bicycles’ thing is just a bi-product of designing roads to cope with massive numbers of motorbikes and scooters, but I’m not complaining!)

Looking around the city, I didn’t have a set plan of what to do, but I had a lovely time just wondering around the streets, taking in the sights and sounds, and seeing what I could find. The streets themselves were really interesting – in the old quarter each of the streets specialise mostly in a particular trade or product, so that on one street you might find lots of flowers, in the next one it might be fishing tackle, in the next one it might be coffee beans and dried pulses. The street next to my hostel seems to specialise in metal kitchenware, and it’s particularly impressive to see motorbikes loaded up and towering with goods to the point of imbalance trundling along the road resupplying the shops! In my wanderings I also came across a market, a couple of temples (one with some kind of ceremony happening inside it,) a European style cathedral in a square (presumably a hang over from french colonialism), and Train Street – literally a street with a train that goes down the middle.

Another thing which brightened my day, quite aside from being in a beautiful city, was… I met up with Fiona! Fiona is a fellow solo female traveller from the UK who I met by virtue of the coincidence of being in the same carriage on the train from Warsaw to Moscow, back near the start of my trip. Through another fortuitous coincidence, we ended up arriving in Hanoi on the same day, and met up for a morning of coffee and sightseeing! It made me very happy to have a partner in crime for the morning! Together we went to see the colourful ceramic murals along the walls of ceramic street, and walked across Long Bien bridge to see Hanoi laid out infront us. A good time was had by all 🙂

Hanoi, being the capital, is also an extremely useful and important stop in my trip as it provides me with an opportunity to regroup and reorganize for my onward journey. Everything is available here, which is not the case in most of the smaller rural towns. While I am here I am going to take the opportunity to do some sorting out, but also take some time to do some sightseeing around the many attractions in the local area. On the list of things to do (other than organizing myself) is visiting Cat ba island / Ha Long Bay, staying in Yen Duc village (another ecotourism village,) and of course some more time wandering around, exploring, and enjoying this beautiful city!