The Race Is On....

Two weeks, three night buses, a boat trip, hardly any sleep, a bus gang of friends who were powering through the country in a short space of time like us.... There was no hanging about, we sailed through Vietnam in a flash.

It's not as touristy as Thailand, there's not as many young people as in Laos. You walk into a shop, try and order something, the shop keeper gives you something else. You argue it's not what you ordered, then they say, "same same but different". Which actually doesn't make any sense.

Six Places I advise to Visit In Nam

1) Hanoi
One of the craziest and busiest cities I've experienced so far. Guaranteed to see at least a hundred mopeds on one street at one time. Whether on the road or parked / sprawled across the pavement. There are random shops especially tacky toy shops dotted everywhere. Hanoi has no traffic lights, so you pretty much take your life into your own hands when crossing the road.

Must Sees - Ho Chi Minh (a previous leader), The Embalmed Turtle Temple in lake (we went but missed the turtle, as you do. We're clueless, you knew this already!), Water Puppet Show - different and ancient, the only drawback is that the whole hour long show is in Vietnamese and pretty hard to follow.

The Good - True to it's roots. Hardly anyone speaks English, so it's not too touristy and it's cheap.
The Bad - Nightlife, although we had fun in an Irish Pub on St Patrick's day, apart from that it was pretty dry. There's also nowhere to get food late at night.
The Ugly - Traffic and also clothes shops. Think Joan Collins, Dynasty, zebra print with shoulder pads!

Rate out of 10 : 3

2) Ha Long Bay
This place is in the process of trying to earn recognition as one of the natural wonders of the world. It's picturesque, tranquil and a nice break if only to get away from hectic Hanoi for a bit!

Must Sees - Two or three day boat trips. Luckily for us our bus gang came on the trip so it was more of a booze cruise than anything else. The Caves are interesting, they have unnatural lighting and man made springs, unfortunately. Tour guides will try and convince you that rock formations look like certain things, but it's a bit like cloud gazing and down to your own personal opinion. We saw a remote floating village (including ATM and souvenir shops!). You can also go kayaking and swimming in the beautiful surroundings. Cat Ba island has a mountain you can climb which has a great view. We were under the impression we were taking a 20 minute stroll on flat land, so wore dresses and flip flops for this! I did have to trade my sandals with the tour guide for his trainers as it was nearly impossible to climb.

The Good - Nature and scenery
The Bad - The Tour Guide's English
The Ugly - No set price for the trip. Some people pay 30 US dollars, some pay 40 dollars, some even 70 dollars and they all end up on the same boat trip.

Rate out of 10: 6

3) Hue
For those history junkies like myself, this place is teeming with it. The DMZ tour or Demilitarized Zone Tour takes you into the small and restrictive tunnels where people hid for years during the Vietnamese War. You also visit a US army base and learn exactly what happened in the lead up and during the conflict.

The Good - Interesting tour and not too upsetting.
The Bad - Again tour guide not speaking great English. Between what I knew, had googled and the email my dad sent me breaking it down into understandable snippets of information, I managed to work out what the tour guide was talking about.
The Ugly - Outside the US Army Base some punters were trying to sell genuine badges and medals, which they'd taken from corpses.
Rate out of 10: 7

4) Hoi An
Like stepping into a pretty French riviera town, this place boasts fancy restaurants laced in ivy, boutiques, dress and suit shops on every corner, a meandering river with spectacular Chinese lanterns dangling from it. It definitely has class. Here we ate well and even had dresses and shoes made (and for cheap!)

The Good - Excellent quality of clothes, which you can have personalised or a high standard copy made.
The Bad - You get harassed all the time for suits/ clothes/ shoes.
The Ugly - It's hard to find much ugly about the place, I guess I'd have to say the nightlife stank. There was nowhere that stayed open late and one very small bar that had nobody in it.

Rate out of 10: 6

5) Nha Trang
This place has a beach, so it propelled itself quite highly in my estimation before we even arrived. Unfortunately there was no sun to go with the beach, just huge waves and lots of rain. A lot more nightlife than Hoi An here too.

The Good - The beach would have been good if there had been even a hint of nice weather. Also, the food in the Sailing Club, which was fancy and inexpensive.
The Bad - Nightlife as I said before was better than Hoi An, but then again my living room has more life than that sleepy town! Nha Trang had two places - Why Not Bar, which was okay and usually busy. Then the Sailing Club. That was it though.
The Ugly - The Redbull in the vases (drinking vases). I didn't sleep for about three days.

Rate out of 10: 7 and a half


6) Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon)
Markets, night markets, food markets.... wait... more markets!

The Good - It's like Hanoi, but better as you can walk down the street
The Bad - The traffic, but better than Hanoi... only just.
The Ugly - Did I mention this place had markets? Well did I mention the stroppy market sellers? They're annoying, persistent and quite rude also.


So Vietnam.. we rushed through it, but we still did everything we intended. Vietnam is unique, different, untouched, frustrating and beautiful.

The thing that made it good for me was the bus crowd. It was nice helping each other along the way to find hostels, or tell each other what to see, where to eat etc.
The bad bits were the language barriers, but on the flip side, apart from in the markets, you weren't hassled too much.
The ugly part was the traffic, the driving, the lack of traffic lights, the way families would pile onto a bike with no helmets on, the pollution and the constant noise of horns beeping drove me up the wall.

Besides that, I had fun, I'll never forget it, and I'm knackered now.
Although it's typically Asian, it seems to be like nowhere I've ever been before in South East Asia. Same same but different I'd say... So would a local for that matter!