Asia 2018: Day #2 Mausoleums and Motorbikes

We slept a little during the first night, though not for as long as we'd wanted. It had started to rain during the night and the roof run-off landing in puddles on the hotel room's balcony woke me a couple of times. This added to the body clock being out by four hours didn't lead to a lot of deep sleep.

Hotel facade

We felt better in the morning, if not as good as we'd hoped. My missing item turned out to be a cable that I knew I would need for the new camera I'd purchased. The cable utilised the same connection as my e-reader, and was one that I usually never carried with me as the e-reader could hold a full charge for over a month. I had never seen the point in carrying a cable that I wasn't likely to use and so generally left it home. Without it I wouldn't be able to download any camera pictures to my laptop; a nuisance but not the end of the world.

Twenty minutes after starting to look for it I still couldn't find it and headed for the shower. Typically the answer came to me when I wasn't thinking about the question: the cable was in a small case I used to hold the external hard drive I brought to hold all the photos. I hadn't thought of it as I'd been smart enough to put the case into the hotel safe the previous night. Another example of hiding something so well even you forget where it is.

Cable found, breakfast completed and we were off to see Uncle Ho. The day was cool and overcast with a hint of impending rain which only turned out to be a brief afternoon shower and some minor drizzle. Nothing to worry about.

Views from the hotel room balcony over Hanoi Old Quarter

As stated in an earlier post, we had missed out on seeing the mummified body of Ho Chi Minh the last time we were in town in 2012 due to a combination of wrong days: the first day the mausoleum was shut, and on the second the waiting line before opening was so long we were in danger of still being there when our flight left the next day.

This time all was easy with no waiting time, few crowds and a straightforward walk along the covered walkway leading to the tomb, the slow and silent file past and then the exit. Total time about 30 minutes, including bag drop-off.

Uncle Ho's mausoleum

Robyn has now seen the Big Three of modern mummies: Mao, Lenin and Ho. I'm still missing Mao, so wouldn't mind getting to Beijing at some time to rectify that situation.

We got back to the hotel, had a quick stop and headed off for a walk around the Old Quarter and the nearby lake. This ended up being a two-hour trek which left us a tad exhausted and in need of a rest before the main event of the day, the Hanoi Street Food tour by motorbike.

Robyn had booked this a few months ago and, to say the least, the prospect of touring Hanoi streets on the back of a small motorbike filled me with a rather high level of fear and loathing.

"Why can't we just walk?" I said.

"Why don't be do something a bit different?" she said. "Anyway, I've already booked."  Checkmate in 2.

And in the end I was glad I went. We both looked a bit daggy in our ill-fitting kiddies' bike helmets, but that was soon forgotten.

Over three hours we toured around the Hanoi Old Quarter stopping off here and there to try various local street food. Sometimes sitting on reasonable chairs and sometimes on those tiny kindergarten plastic jobs. And always the food was excellent, from small spring rolls and curry puffs,

to crepes

to bun cha

to the Hanoi specialty, egg coffee.

A fantastic experience, probably only available in Vietnam. And even though Rob's hip played up and became rather sore, we both loved it.