Detailed Postings for Day One
- The Eyes in the Sky @ Hanoi
- Bonsella Hotel - Premier City View Room
- Banh Mi Long Hoi
- Show @ Thang Long Water Puppet Theatre
- Nem Nướng Nha Trang Quế
- Kim Ngân Communal House
- Ear Digging at Queen Spa
- Ta Hien Beer Street
- Vua Chả Cá - Vietnamese Grilled Fish
Awaiting for boarding our Scoot Airbus A320 plane.
First trip to Hanoi and very excited. For someone who has never been to Vietnam for the past few decades, I was a roll here as my inaugural trip, to Ho Chi Minh City, was only about six months earlier!
Boarding time!
One thing I noted from this flight was that the plane travelled quite a while to the runway and from the surrounding construction, it seemed that we would be departing from the new one bordering the upcoming terminal 5.
Construction for Terminal 5. This would be an exciting place for the next few days and I am so looking forward to the developments as Singapore never fails to disappoint with its airport, except for maybe Seletar Airport.
Another jetty in the making?
More land reclamation at Pulau Tekong; would it take over the top spot as Singapore's biggest offshore island in the next few years? p.s. our neighbor will be so pissed off as I remember the fishermen at the Southern coast have been complaining of a lesser catch with continuous land reclamation.
Time-lapsed of the departure for your reference.
Cruising past Pulau Tinggi and Pulau Sibu. The more popular island would be Pulau Tioman which is further north. p.s. There are two Sibu in Malaysia; the other one is a landlocked city at Sarawak in East Malaysia.
Arrived at Vietnam although this was still a thousand kilometers away from our destination. This area is south of HCMC and near Tân An, "the capital city of Long An Province in Mekong Delta region of Vietnam".
At this horizon, it felt as if we just needed to rise a bit higher to see space! Well, it's still a long stretch; a plane typically flies at an altitude of 8-11 kilometers whereas the kármán line is 100 kilometers.
Plane was descending!
Time to whip out the mobile phone for that irresistible time-lapsed video. To me, I think the best invention is airplane. Who would imagine a few centuries ago that humans are able to navigate the sky like birds?
Do check out The Eyes in the Sky @ Hanoi. The area surrounding the Noi Bai International Airport seemed to be pretty underdeveloped with plenty of low-rise buildings and farmland.
Time-lapsed video again!
This time, for the landing!
I think that's the Soc Sơn Mountain.
Random photographs; some of the houses were so close to the airport! I never mind living near airports although what's more important is the soundproofing of your residence.
After clearing immigration, my friends made a beeline for the local SIM counter. I used to do that in the past but Starhub roaming allows me to choose from multiple local service providers which I thought would be more convenient, albeit at a higher price.
Way more keen with the eateries. Prices were arguably cheaper in the airport but it would be way more expensive at the departure areas. Hence, if you are craving for fried chicken after a few days of having Vietnamese cuisine, you may consider Popeyes Fried Chicken at the public section for arrivals.
Loving the coolness when I stepped out of the airport! The climate was so comfortable; I told myself I should bring my parents to Hanoi before they get too old!
GRAB ride that cost 309,000 dong to Bonsella Hotel. Kon and Lock took another GRAB as they would be staying at another hotel for the first night, that's pretty far from us.
Absolutely love towering structures like the Nhat Tan Bridge. In tiny Singapore, you don't see such bridges as they are a waste of space. If the Singapore government can have its way, all roads will be underground.
Nhat Tan Bridge "has a total length of 8.3 kilometres (5.2 mi), including a 3.7 kilometres (2.3 mi) bridge, with 1.5 kilometres (0.93 mi) cable-stayed bridge with five spans crossing the Red River". The five "towers" symbolized the five ancient gates in Hanoi, situated at the Thang Long Citadel.
Bridge also spanned across the Red River is a "a 1,149-kilometer long river that flows from Yunnan in Southwest China through northern Vietnam to the Gulf of Tonkin"; doesn't look that red to me.
High rise developments beckoned!
I can't find the location of this ancient looking temple although I recalled it bordered the West Lake; largest lake in Hanoi and quite near Tran Quoc Pagoda.
GRAB driver who sent us from our home to Changi International Airport commented that Hanoi has endless honking with insanely heavy traffic. My honest takeaway is that HCMC is worse!
Our stay for the next six nights; in Bonsella Hotel! Do check out my review here. In a nutshell, friendly customer service with good English, acceptable variety for buffet breakfast (given that there were only 24 rooms) on the 11th floor (nice view) and near to Hoan Kiem Lake (Old Quarter area).
Exploring the Hoan Kiem lake as I needed to familiarize myself since I would be jogging around it for the next few days. A detailed post on this lake, steeped in history and legend, would be published soon!
Cyclo - the Vietnamese version of a trishaw! I heard there are a few scams associated with this; hence, it might be better for you to engage the service from a reputable local agency.
I didn't know what came over me but I so feel like having an ice cream in the cool weather! This shop was located near the lake and I was drawn to its ready scoops of ice cream cones in the freezer!
Totally not worth the 45,000 dong, which was already expensive when such ice cream cones, common in Hanoi, would be priced at 20,000 dong or less! The cone was hollow like those you can get from supermarkets and the taste was bland, without the expected milky richness.
The unique Cong Cafe; I bet you can identify it anywhere in the world given it uses a very unconventional color, army green, to paint its cafes. I came back to this location (called Dong Kinh Nghia Thuc Square) on my second last day; to take time-lapsed video!
See these street hawkers? They would offer you one ball, supposed to try out, but they would flip when you decide not to buy! I was quoted six sesame / caramel balls for 80,000 dong (S$5.00) and that's ridiculous given it had no filling, cold and a waste of your calories. Eventually, I just passed her one 10,000 dong to stop her screaming. Ignorant me should have been more careful!
Met up with Kon and Lock outside Thang Long Water Puppet Theatre, and they came with Kem Bo, which means Avocado Ice Cream. I remember having this delicious dessert at Ho Thi Ky food street in HCMC!
As I walked past this stall, I told myself that should I damage my sandals again (as I did on my last day of my HCMC trip), I would have plenty to choose from, from the above.
First meal in Hanoi, Banh Mi Long Hoi, where banh mi was given names like love, wealthy, luckiness, happy! Check out my review here. Walking down the staircase is scary for clumsy souls like me.
Catching the water puppetry show at Thang Long Water Puppet Theatre, one of the oldest in the city. And you would be surprised that ticket pricing for this 50-minute show wasn't exorbitant; cheapest of which cost just 100,000 dong (less than S$6.00).
Continuing our eating spree; at Nem Nướng Nha Trang Quế that served spring rolls. We were totally sold on the Nha Trang Spring Roll, which was deemed a healthy enough meal for our usually sinful decadences.
3D cards of notable landmarks, scenes in Vietnam.
How many can you identify?
Aside from the Shark Jaws building, I felt this was another iconic building that bordered the Dong Kinh Nghia Thuc Square; there's somewhat a colonial era feel to it although it housed several eateries serving international cuisines like Thai and Taiwanese.
The captivating yet dreadful helium balloon sellers; dreadful not because the sellers were bad, just that helium balloons are such terrors to the environment and they are not exactly captivating once deflated. Read here for more context!
Charming streets of Hanoi's Old Quarter; there were 36 of them and to be frank, I didn't really keep a lookout for them, and have no intention to blog about each of them, in detail.
Massage parlors were everywhere even though to be honest, I don't quite enjoy the Vietnamese style of massage, preferring to bone-cracking ones from Thailand instead.
You have to admit that the restaurant will draw eyeballs from those walking past! Restaurant's name is Bancông Cafe & Restaurant and it draws a high review rating of 4.8 on Google map review. p.s. in Hanoi, the review score is sometimes not believable, as we found out on day 3.
Kim Ngân Communal House; a beautiful traditional community centre that had been in existence for a few centuries, since the 15th century in fact.
No doubt the lanterns played a part in stopping us from our stroll to nowhere! As a home person, the one question on my mind would be the difficulties faced in having to clean so many lanterns!
Street scenes.
So tempted to have seafood, yet so afraid of the potential risk of gastroenteritis. In addition, I am never too sure on what's considered a good deal when it comes to seafood even though seafood in Singapore is known to be pricey!
Looking more like a hotel than a hostel, the Hanoi Buffalo Hostel has a swimming pool and does offer double rooms with ensuite washrooms! Location: near Ta Hien Beer Street.
Many such quaint little coffee cafes around. Even though I am a coffee drinker, I am not a connoisseur and isn't that fixated on the quality of the beans. Something similar to our local Singapore coffee will do.
Now, the happening Ta Hien Beer Street! For more photos of the main beer drinking arena in the whole of Hanoi, click here. We didn't intend to drink but since Alex was having his hair cut at a nearby barber, it was decided we shall take the opportunity to drink, given that Alex doesn't like alcohol that much.
There's even a table karaoke!
How does that even work?!
If not for the scene on the ground floor, you would be forgiven for thinking you are in a European country! It's called Timeline Coffee & Restaurant for me, the main attraction had to be the elevated view on the second floor; conducive for time-lapsed street video!
Dried squid, grilled over charcoal, would have been nice for ice cold beer. I must remind myself to get some dried squid from Mr Sotong the next time I visit Malaysia.
Just in case you assume we were done with food; we hadn't even touched dinner! Let's have it at Vua Chả Cá for my first take on the signature Vietnamese grilled fish, and the accompanying fermented prawn paste (delish by the way)!
For digestion; a walk along Hoan Kiem Lake would be helpful. It's a beautiful sight at night, given the illumination at the Ngoc Son Temple that was on a island in the lake.
Leading towards the entrance of Ngoc Son Temple, which had already closed for the day. I actually managed to visit on the last day of my trip and it was pretty interesting with two gigantic, taxidermized softshell turtles in one of the rooms.
The strikingly red The Huc bridge that connected us to Ngoc Son Temple, made redder by the lights; kind of eerie should you be all alone though.
Random photographs - the Great Kon just got his Samsung Galaxy S23 and he was showing us how great the pictures turned out, even under low light! Damn for iPhone users like me, who are too lazy to switch to a non-Apple one!
Took using the Kon's phone camera!
Legit nice with Alex looking like a model.
A group photo!
Statue of King Ly Thai To that was at a park next to Hoan Kiem Lake. This shall be where we bade our goodbyes to Kon and Lock, as they were staying in another hotel nearing Hanoi Opera House.
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