Photos #2 - Hanoi

Glad to see so many people enjoying the photos... after Saigon there was a short (and very good) flight north on the new Vietjet domestic service, then into the more modest surrounds of Hanoi, much of which was new to me... first off, private car to the city...

Traditional 'skinny houses'... found all across Vietnam, home to millions, and bane of the city planner's life, as the government tries to push the masses away from overcrowded city centres and out into the suburbs.

Then checking in to the amazing Grand Metropole, now know as the Sofitel Metropole Legend, Hanoi...

Metropole (old side)... what the Continental was to Saigon, the Metropole still is to Hanoi... opened in 1901, more real history than anywhere else in the city. Hangout of spies, diplomats and the rich and famous, from Charlie Chaplin to Somerset Maugham to Joan Baez (who wrote hipppy war songs here while US bombs fell) to Brad and Ange...

What can you say really... the view down from the mezzanine outside our fourth floor suite. I had convinced Lala we were roughing it after Saigon...

Out and about, three days in Hanoi

                                               Temple on the small lake (names escape me)

 Lakeside, Old Town

And then it rained... a lot... but it was ok, as we found a bar... which we became good at when it rained

Love the scooter workshops... like a modern day blacksmith's

Changing of the guard, Ho Chi Minh's mausoleum

Bit windy for swans on the big lake, but we did have a coffee on a floating restaurant... which we had to leave as soon as I pointed out to Lala that it was floating, and she became seasick. Or possibly it was because she ordered an 'ice coffee with milk' and they misheard and brought her an 'iced milk' (condensed milk with water in it).

                                                                                       Barbershop

Mobile shop... or maybe just a restaurant on the go...

Not widely advertised but interesting, the huge archaeological excavation in the middle of town, with layers of old Hanoi dating back to around 1000AD (I assume it was open to the public, there was nobody there and I just walked in through a gate... shortly after this we saw all the "Photography Prohibited" signs)

And then another propaganda palace, the Vietnam Military Museum.. Glory or gloating, guess it depends on your point of view...

Apparently one of the actual tanks that rolled over the gates of the Reunification Palace (at the time the Independence Palace) in the famous photo of the fall of Saigon

A monument made of parts from downed enemy (US, French and South Vietnamese) aircraft... hmm, tasteful...

US statistics state that between 13 and 17 B52s were shot down during the conflict... the plaque at the Vietnam Military Museum says they shot down 68...