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We left at around 8:30 Monday morning after grabbing breakfast in the hotel (an omelette again), and got on the coach for the 3 hour drive back to Hanoi. We then were escorted by Pooky our tour leader for a walk to the old quarters where we booked tickets for a water puppet show the next day. We were then left to explore. We first had lunch and then went for a wander, and looked at the lake, the palace in the middle of the lake, the opera house and the cathedral. A bit of a pottering day as I think everyone was very tired. We then went back to the hotel for a relax and a nice hot bath (well I did, Graeme had to have a cold one cuz I used up the water!).
On the Tuesday we had a nice lie in. We then booked our tickets for Wednesday for the sleeper coach - as we booked for this day we will have an old bus which means no loo! Arrr! However, I've taken some advice from our tour leader. She said that for long journeys with no toilet she wears adult pampers…hmm apparently it's a mental thing, if you have them on for safety it trains your mind not to need the loo!
We headed out for the day and went to the Ho Chi Minh museum where Graeme made friends with some Chinese men who wanted him to go in their photo! We stopped for a lunch of beef stew and then headed to the post office to post some bits. We then found a nice café that did banana milkshakes and garlic chips and chilled in there before the puppet show. The show was very good, all puppets in water with a live band. At the end the puppeteers come out of the water. After the show we went for our last meal with our group as today is the last day of the tour. We went for some nice icecream afterwards at Fanny's. Mmm. We then said our goodbyes to a few people who were heading on.
Today (Wednesday) we headed out to met up with the other 3 couples on our tour for lunch (who are staying in Hanoi a few more days). On the way to lunch we stopped at a few street shops and Rachel had a look for the items mentioned 2 paragraphs earlier…… She found some. She asked how much and excepted without trying to haggle. Then, instead of letting the women think she was buying them for someone else she tried explaining that she needed them for the 24-hour bus ride. The women looked very embarrassed, Rachel carried on trying to defend herself until we finally walked away with the goods with the lady giggling to herself, I think that will be a story she tells all her friends.
After lunch with the other couples we then went on a flying visit of the prison museum, needed about an hour but did it in 20 minutes missing the 2nd floor. We then rushed back to the hotel in a taxi, which ripped us off, grabbed some baguettes for the 24 hr bus ride and then waited in the hotel for them to pick us up. We were finally told that the bus wouldn't come down the narrow street where the hotel was so we would get a moped to it…….. We looked outside at the one moped, looked at each other, then looked at our 2 big rucksacks and 2-day bags and laughed. We said we had bags and the guy said he would call another moped, which sounded like good fun to me and I got me camera out ready to take a picture of Rachel with all her luggage on the back. He then took a look at all our gear and said he would call us a taxi.
We got in the taxi expecting it to be a 2-minute ride but it was about 20 minutes so we were glad we didn't get the bikes. The whole journey the taxi was following the guy on the bike, and the bike driver kept pulling up next to the taxi and shouting at him, we were very confused. We finally worked out that he was telling the taxi driver to hurry up and to push through small gaps to get ahead, he kept waving his hand pointing the taxi into small gaps to get ahead, like a cowboy herding a cow. It was ok for the biker but I felt a bit sorry for the taxi driver, if it was me I would have knocked so many people of their bikes trying to fit in the gaps.
We finally got to the bus station around 18:20, and was wondering why we had rushed as the bus wasn't due to leave till 19:00. We got out the taxi and the guy on the moped told us to follow another guy, which we did at a million miles per hour, he then took us to another guy and told us to follow him, which we did at 2 million miles per hour. We then arrived at the coach with plenty of time to spare, loaded our stuff on and thought that's good we have half an hour to go to the toilet before the 24 hour bus ride (which had no toilet)…….we were wrong the doors shut and the bus drove off ready for the fun to begin.
- comments
mum Was very amused about the pampers!!! Love Mum xxxx
Neil That water puppet show was the worst expiriance of my life! Can't believed you enjoyed it lol