Hanoi from the Nikon

Hanoi was chaotic. Chaotic in the sense that there was so much going on. So much life and activity on every corner and every turn. Traffic in itself was entertaining in itself, just to watch the intersection from a high floor was filled with drama and suspense. I didn't enjoy it as much as I did Hong Kong or Bandung, but I guess that is due to the language barrier with reference to road signs and we got abit lost a few times. It's not a backward place, it still has its charm and you woulnd't see the french influenced architecture unless you looked up, cos ground level is just crazy. Free wi-fi is readily available at pretty much every cafe or restaurant. A side note though, if you're on the M1 network, it is best to check if they offer a data roaming plan. Cos once we got lost away trying to find a cat cafe(yeah, I know) from the main city and our map didn't cover the area, I got on my google map and did google searches to get our bearings and later got a text from M1 saying I had already amassed a $100 charge from data roaming. Their promo when I was in HK or KL, was usually capped at $18/day but I later found out that they did not have any telco partners in the area, so boohoo...

But anyway...

Needless to say, we walked a hell lot and it was hot and we did venture out of the city to Halong Bay which was beautiful but bearing in mind, there will be hundreds of other tour cruises around and so you  might have to bump your way to the front to get a perfect picture. We went on a Monday and it wasn't that bad. I can't imagine how a weekend would be like though.

Additional info : We stayed at Finnegans Hotel 2, booked through Hostelworld. The service and room were fantastic for its price (about $20/person a night). Really clean and the room is spacious. Hotel owner, Hoa  and her colleague, Hai really made us feel welcome and was really helpful all the time. She booked our Halong Bay day tour for us with Alova Cruises who were also fantastic, the guide, Vuong was really friendly and entertaining.