After a couple days of rest (traveling the world is exhausting! 😉), my friends and I (minus Saherish and Liz who went to Cambodia) flew up to Hanoi, the capital of Vietnam. It was much colder up north (a chilly 70° brrrr).
The French influence was heavy in the architecture and little things I noticed throughout the city. The French gradually extended their control over Vietnam (and nearby Laos and Cambodia) over a period of 350 years ending in the 1950s. There were several bilingual schools that were taught in French and English, not Vietnamese, which I thought was interesting. A lot of buildings had little balconies that felt as though we were in a small French town. There were also several French patisseries and restaurants spread throughout the city. We had fun going to a water puppet show and a cafe that had post it notes people had written and posted all over the walls called "the Note Coffee."
The second day we were in Hanoi we were picked up by our tour guide who took us to Halong Bay! After a four hour bus ride we got onto our boat for our two day cruise around the islands. They had so many activities planned for us—hiking up Ti-Top island, cave exploring, playing soccer with locals, a cooking demonstration, karaoke, and—my favourite—kayaking around the islands. We spent that night on the boat and got up the next morning for a four hour bus ride back to Hanoi!
What an action-packed, beautiful couple days we spent before flying back to Ho Chi Minh to board the ship!
Gosh I can't get over how blessed I am to be on this adventure. What an incredible twelve days in Vietnam. As we head back down the Saigon River tonight on our way to Malaysia I reflect on these experiences and just can't believe this is my life.
Pictured below: the cave we were able to explore, me kayaking, me at the note coffee, me at the top of ti-top island, and a group pic!
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