Vietnam Trip Part I

Thanks to Chris who planned this whole trip himself, both Cien An and me got to hitch along a "mysterious" and exotic trekking trip into the northern parts of Hanoi. It all started when I overheard from a bro during our Wed prayer meet (pays to go for prayer meet :P) about a pending trip to Vietnam by my ex-shepherd. Since I was going to be totally free (bummer) I said, I want to join, and without even realizing what we were really doing, I committed myself to this trip haphazardly.

Actually I'm so thankful that I did. It was a refreshingly good break for me, a pure holiday, not for work, not for missions, not for any other agenda except to let free.... :P

sometimes we do need one of these trips.

We flew with Jetstar, which had these unfriendly flight times (7:15am) which added much more to your total fare in terms of taxi fare. Anyways, it was a little scare for me on that faithful day as CA asked me to share cab with him. But in the morning while on the cab, I frantically smsed him and called him but there was no response (530am). So I had to go up to this apartment, knocked on the doors and even shouted (softly coz 5am) but still no one. Finally I managed to get him through James Ray's phone.... CA totally zonked off as he only just returned from a overseas trip and was using a new unfamiliar phone as an alarm clock.  Anyways, to cut to the chase, we still managed to check in with some time to eat breakfast. And here we go......!

Weather in Ho Chi Minh city definitely was as hot as Singapore. We arrived there 1hr later, 8:15am (2 hrs flight but you gain 1 hr), and had a 4 hr transit time. Luckily for us, the city area is just a short walk away from the international airport. Never seen such near civilization and we just jaywalked to a nearby cafe.

CA picked a "high class" cafe as we weren't too sure about the road stall cafes. We weren't too fussy as it was comfortable, not too expensive and had Wifi. Had my 1st taste of facebook blockage. Vietnam blocks fb, just like China! 2nd meal of the day which cost 202,000 dong or roughly US$10 for the 3 of us (pretty expensive by Vietnamese standards as we found out later on).

Next, it was another 2hr flight to Hanoi and which we sort of hopped on a cab that didn't really know our final destination well... till now I'm not really sure if he took us for a ride as the cab fee was quite high and he didn't know his way. The taxi driver even got impatient as we were questioning if he knew where he was going (apparently he didn't) so we decided to get off early. When we paid him in full, he sounded super glad... The hotel staff whom we asked later on said its around the price for a cab to where we wanted to go to but it just didn't feel certain...



Anyways, took a short walk to the hotel, taking photos along the way... it was definitely much cooler/colder in Hanoi.



Upon reaching our hotel (but we will only stay 1 night 2 days later), Charming II Hotel (newly opened) along 31 Hang Ga Street, Hoan, Kiem, Hanoi, Vietnam (email: booking@hanoicharminghotel.com), we went on only 1st Lonely Planet recommendation to eat at Highway 4. Such a strange name, I kept thinking we were going to some highway. Met up with 2 Australian ladies sitting beside us and a cute little baby girl called Audrey. Later we found out that they were staying at the same hotel as us...

Food was pretty good, the pork was a little bit too dry though but overall satisfying though a little bit westernized/chinese-nized if there was such a word.


Our day's journey did not end yet. Next we made our way to the train station to board our 8:30pm train for Sapa. The external of the trains looked very old but the inside was pretty clean and decent. And we quickly slept due to exhaustion from the early morning till late's travel.