We decided to travel through Vietnam from north to south. So our port of entry was the big city of Hanoi, about which we had already heard and read all sorts of reports. These reports had given us the picture of a turbulent, lively city with lots of noise, buzzing and bustle. However, it very quickly turned out that you can switch off and relax extremely well in Hanoi when you stop here as a world traveller. When we arrived early one weekend evening to check into our hotel in the Old Quarter, Hanoi immediately cast its spell on us. In the Old Quarter you get delicious, cheap food on every corner. We found our first dinner straight away on the touristy Bia Street and were amazed and delighted by the value for money. I already sensed that I wouldn't go short food-wise here, especially as there were lots of vegetables, fresh salads and herbs on the menus. Bia Street is, punningly, actually the beer mile for tourists, where people party from late afternoon until midnight on the dot.
We then took a digestive walk through the streets around the Old Quarter's central Hoan Kiem Lake. Not a moped in sight, crossing streets no problem, because every Friday to Sunday evening the whole Old Quarter area around the lake is closed to vehicles and turned into a so-called walking area. This creates a leisure and recreation area kilometres long, in which Hanoi's residents and tourists can pursue their leisure activities in the middle of the street. Couple dancing, go-karting, street music and the sale of treats shape the evening cityscape. There's even a large dedicated children's zone, where the city's youngest residents are allowed to roam the streets in electric vehicles. Something like that simply makes a city super likeable, and strolling around and stopping now and then to taste treats just feels like relaxation. The favourite pastime of Hanoi's young people and adults seems to be team rope skipping and playing indiaca. So large circles of people form on the newly created pedestrian zone, practising their sports or watching others pursue their hobby with exuberance and joy. After some initial shyness, on our second visit to Hanoi we even joined in the couple dancing and rope skipping. When Chris stepped into the middle of the circle for the rope skipping, an astonished exclamation went through the crowd, and someone next to me whispered "oh, he is so tall...". You have to know that even I, at 1.60 m, count as tall in Vietnam – so the 2 Vietnamese turning the rope had to move a little closer together so that it worked for our Chris. My grin in that moment was priceless. On every corner you can get ice cream or frozen mochis (rice-dough balls filled with ice cream), and the lake, lit up at night, invites you to rest on the benches provided. So how could you not like this city? Admittedly, on weekdays without the pedestrian zone it can probably get a bit more stressful. Our travel tip, then: be sure to plan Hanoi for a weekend!
Hanoi has a nice modern climbing gym (Viet Climb), which we visited during the day to burn off some energy. Since the city is very large and modern, you'll most likely find whatever you're looking for here. To cover long distances in the city, you can simply book a vehicle via the Grab app, just as we already knew it from Indonesia and Malaysia. In hindsight we would have loved to do a street food tour here, but unfortunately we missed out on it. Instead we tasted our way through various restaurants ourselves and were very enthusiastic about the Vietnamese cuisine in the northern capital. Everything here is seasoned with great care, and fresh vegetables and herbs are very important. Our favourites: vegetarian Vietnamese fried spring rolls, pho soup, banh xeo to wrap yourself, banh mi veggie (with papaya salad, and with meat) and fresh raw summer rolls. For desserts, vanilla mochis and bubble tea are definitely our front runners, but we couldn't taste nearly everything we would have liked to.
On our sightseeing tours through Hanoi's markets, however, we realised that the less touristy menu also includes eels, snails, turtles and other "ingredients" unusual for us. The animals can all be bought at the market in cages and water troughs. Dog meat is also eaten here. Officially it has been banned since the beginning of the year, but we learned from friends living here that eating dog meat is still common practice.
From here we booked our onward journey to Sa Pa, a mountain village far in the north. To get there, we each reserved a cabin on a so-called sleeper bus.
But before moving on, we visited the water puppet theatre with live music. We found the performance fantastic. We had deliberately not taken an audio guide so that we could enjoy the music to the full. Even though you couldn't understand the lyrics, the puppetry was very clear and you didn't feel you had missed anything.
After such a successful arrival in a new country, we were really curious to see what northern Vietnam had to offer.
As always, enjoy our short video summary and the photo gallery: