The airport in Hanoi is quite some distance from the city (30 something km), and our cab driver was a bit shady. Along the highway he pulled into a gas station without stopping the meter. Then, without shutting off the engine, he starts filling the tank. Huh? We asked him to take us to Viet Anh Hotel. After driving around a bit, he pulled up to his buddy’s hotel instead. We said this wasn’t it, and the front door guy proceeded with a few dodgy lines: “oh, that other place is not so good. You should stay here.” When we answered no, he asked to see our confirmation at the other hotel before accepting our polite invitation to take a hike.

Swirling around town a bit further, the cabbie took us to another hotel (same name as the first, and still not ours). We were tiring of his little games, and watching the meter continue to run. Pointing to the address, he finally got us to the right place. You gotta watch out for the cabbies in Hanoi apparently!

Other than that, we got settled into our hotel in the old quarter nicely. What an amazing place! Old town Hanoi is hard to describe. Streets are narrow & curve around in all directions like parts of Boston. Sidewalks are not for pedestrians, because hundreds of motor scooters & bicycles are parked on them. Little shops, 10 feet wide mostly, squeeze together along the entire length of the street on both sides. Colorful, lively, crowded with people walking about, shopping, and navigating through the soup of traffic which weaves and curls around in every direction. It’s amazing.

We had dinner in a nearby Indian restaurant that came recommended. It was exotic & ok. Back at the hotel I found high speed internet access on their computers,,, and was up to 1:40am updating the blog. Just trying to keep you up to date! (=