Vietnam - the first 24 hours!

View Larger Map

Hanoi to Halong City

After a relatively good flight from Australia we arrived in Hanoi, and right from the airport the adventure began. We decided to take the airport bus into the city (only $2), while we were waiting to leave a taxi nearly reversed into the bus – the bus driver and some official looking dude (maybe a police man) gave the taxi driver a good clip around the ear! Once the bus was jammed packed we headed into the city.

And sure enough, just as it says in the Lonely Planet the bus dropped us off at the “Spring Hotel”. Unfortunately the Spring Hotel had no vacancies, lucky for us the hotel owner has another very nice hotel just around the corner – determined not to get conned we politely declined their offer and set off trying to find the actual Spring Hotel.

When we did find the Spring Hotel it wasn’t the best, but we were hot and bothered and just wanted to put our bags down and have a shower!

The plan for the rest of the afternoon was to find the train station and buy tickets for the next morning to go to Halong Bay . . . . . . well that was the plan anyway. For two hours we walked around in circles trying to find the station and eventually gave up and headed off to have some dinner. The dramas of the day actually added to the excitement of the evening – Reid proposed over dinner, it was very romantic! We were exhausted and pleased to be sitting down having a cold beer when Reid popped the question, suddenly the troubles of the day were forgotten and the rest of the evening involved lots of smiles and gazing lovingly at each other :p

The next morning we attempted to get the 6am train to Hai Phong. But we ended up at the wrong train station so wrangled a ride on a trailer on the back of a motorbike at high speed to the right station – only to have missed the train by at least 10 minutes!!

We caught our breath and had a huge bowl of Pho Bo (beef noodles) for breakfast.

Sitting at the little café eating breakfast we noticed loads of buses pulling out of a nearby street - with signs saying Halong Bay! We’re in luck! As we headed in the direction of the bus station a mini bus pulled over and a guy leapt out yelling “Halong Bay, Halong Bay”. There were a few other western tourists on the bus so on we hopped! Finally we were on our way ☺

Turns out we were just the first in a LONG line of passengers to be scooped up off the street and jammed onto the bus!

As the bus speed along the motorway, swerving amongst the traffic a guy at the front of the bus was learning out the door yelling at every person standing or walking anywhere near the road, what we can only assume was something like “where are you going”?? After a particularly long negotiation a woman with two young kids got on the bus – both the kids screamed for a good half hour, before they eventually got their own seat at the back of the bus. Not long after one of the kids puked all over the seat and all over Reid’s bag!! What a treat!

On the bright side, we did meet Chris and Jo (from England). It was nice to share the trip with someone and it took the stress out of the experience – when we finally got off the bus we didn’t feel too pressured to rush into the next thing, we just all sat down, had a beer, and relaxed for a while.