Getting back to a 'proper' city has been very good and even though there is less traffic here than in Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon) it is still busy, busy, busy with motorcycles, taxis, bicycles, buses and the odd tuk tuk all whizzing about the city streets, peeping horns, twenty four hours a day. Crossing the roads is challenging in a different way as the drivers seem slightly more erratic and they don't seem to be able to judge pedestrian flows across the roads qui...

Be prepared for almost anything except maybe peace and quiet when catching a train in Vietnam. Our four weeks of travel through this country was mainly completed by train, with the odd taxi and a couple of boat trips to add a bit of excitement. Our 1,200 miles of rail travel was done in Soft Class air conditioned seats with the exception of the trip to Haiphong which was in Hard Class with air conditioning. Our journey with Vietnamese Railways started in Ho Ch ...