Kate:
I went to Vietnam with two friends from May 15 to May 22. We stayed in Hanoi for three days and took a rowboat up the Perfume River to the Perfume Pagoda, a 150 year old Buddhist temple and pagoda. Despite the pouring rain it was an incredibly serene and beautiful trip.

We flew to Danang and caught a cab to Hoi An. We walked and took cyclos around this picturesque town. We then drove back to Danang the next day in order to catch the train up the East Coast of Vietnam to Hue - the old empirical capital of Vietnam. The train ride was spectacular and gave us an real taste of local transport and foods (snacks on the train consisted of dried squid, seahorses and starfish and you could purchase snake juice tonic in Hoi An, with the snakes still in the bottles. A first class ticket for this 4 hour trip cost ). The citadel, temples and tombs were quite remarkable and the effects of war starkly apparent. We went for a cruise up the Perfume River and rode motorbikes to the larger palaces, tombs and temples.

We then flew back to Hanoi. The next day we hired a car to take us to Halong Bay and back.

Hanoi is a beautiful, traditional city.
Transport in Hanoi is largely by foot, bicycle and motor bike. Traffic is horrendous ...... but very colourful. The noise of horns tooting in every direction fills the air. The lifestyle is simple with the locals selling their produce on the sidewalks and from the baskets which they carry on a bamboo pole over their shoulders. 70% of Vietnamese are rice farmers and they work in extremely demanding conditions.