Day 8

Day 8
A quick bike ride at dawn (7am) over the bridge to the outlying village areas proved interesting and worth a look. A concrete, recently laid road led us about three kms through a waking populace on a peninsula like area. Intermittent rain couldn’t dampen our soaring spirits as we biked free as birds or mothers on holiday before parking our bikes and entering the city market once more in search of a pre breakfast snack.

Back to the pancake lady after passing new and exciting sights of croaking frogs just before they were skinned alive and snake/eels slithering in a bucket as we were ushered to seats (wooden slats) where the plastic table cloth was lovingly placed and we partook of a bowl of the local specialty, Cao Lau noodles.

Temporarily sated we returned to the hotel on bikes and showered and packed and took one last meal at the resort . Five plates of brekky later, we rested briefly in the room before being collected. We waved our superfriendly super assertive Hoi Anians farewell and headed for the airport.

The flight was large and quick. Blue skies emerged as we headed away from Monsoon Hoi An. Upon landing, our trusty tour guide awaited. A cute looking Asian Leonardo DiCaprio called Sun (pron. Soon) swaggered confidently grinning charismatically at us. We put him to work immediately protecting our luggage while we relieved ourselves at the nearby WC.

Forty minutes into a racy Hanoi then a ten minute turnaround at the hotel and we were bundled back into our "çar" for the three hour walking tour to orient ourselves around Hanoi (capital of Vietnam). Dropped in peak traffic around the French quarter we walked through vast expanses of land put aside for governmental fancies like Ho Chi Mihn’s mausoleum, the temple of Literature and the President’s palace. We dutifully followed the less than exuberant but nevertheless knowledgeable Sun as he waited patiently outside while we investigated the ins and outs of the historical hot spots.

Three hours later and as hungry as wolves, we bid Sun goodbye and high tailed it up to our 7th floor bar that had been sadly left to rack and ruin and ordered restorative G and T’s with a seafood and beef noodle chaser revelling in the freedom and air high above the chaos of downtown Hanoi.

With full stomachs and heads buzzing we returned to our modern conveniently chilled rooms to shower off the day and slip into our robes for a well deserved rest.