We made it back to Hanoi earlier than expected... 4.30am!! Tired and bleary eyed, we got off the train and thought we'd get a taxi into the Old Quarter to try and find a hotel or coffee shop to wait in. The taxi drivers refused to use their meters, and they wanted to charge us a ridiculous price to go a very short distance, so we decided to walk instead. Hanoi is very different to Ho Chi Minh in that it has a curfew. At midnight everything closes up and the streets are empty. There were no hotels or cafés open at 5am. We decided to deposit the family and the bags at The Cathedral, as this is a central place with a nice sidewalk and it's relatively clean. We then walked around to see if there was anything open for to grab a coffee and wait in until a more decent hour. There wasn't anything, except for a very unhelpful backpackers who wouldn't let us come in and order coffee from their restaurant (it was only open for guests). We also had a horrible experience, Mel was on her phone 'googling' to see if there was anywhere we could go. Two guys drove past and tried to grab her phone but luckily she's a bit street smart, and was holding the phone close to her body and with two hands, so they didn't manage to grab it. Sufficiently rattled, we made our way back to the waiting family and sat down to wait until 7am when things would start to open.
Eventually, the sun started to rise and things started to open! We were able to deposit our bags and change at the hotel where the rest of the family was staying that night. We then went to get some breakfast! Hanoi is a beautiful city but we found that there isn't too much touristy stuff to do, it's more of a central hub to do things from. Since we'd done a lot of the site-seeing things when we arrived in Hanoi, we took everyone to The Women's Museum. It's an extremely interesting museum that is well worth a visit if you are up north. It's great to see a side of Vietnam that is not focussed solely on the war. Instead, it tells you about their history but it is centred around the women's roles in history.
After the trip to the museum, it was time for us to leave the family and head back to Ho Chi Minh. We collected our bags and then we went and had some Banh Mi's for lunch. Jo wasn't feeling well, but she had to eat, so she ordered a rather tiny little one!
It was horrible to say goodbye to everyone, as we had such a great time with them all. We would much rather have headed to Halong Bay with them instead of going back to work.
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