Nov 18 Day 1 Tour of Hanoi

The day started with a fantastic breakfast in our hotel. Our tour guide picked us up at 8:30 and took us to the money exchange house, where I instantly became a millionaire! As US$100 is equal to 2,500,000 Vietnamese dong. From there, we started our tour at the Dong Xuan market. This market was at least two stories high and absolutely full of every thing a person could want to buy. I picked up some knock off air pods for about C$22. Hopefully they work. lol. After an hour or so of shopping, we continued on to visit Hoan Kiem Lake, the one pillar pagoda, the temple of literature,the bach ma temple, and a tour of the Hoa Lo Museum, better known as the Hanoi Hilton! The one pillar pagoda is a historic Buddhist temple. The temple of literature was built in the year 1070. It's Vietnam's first national University. The gardens are said to be a Ying Yang design where each side of the centre path is identical. Two ponds on either side contain huge Koi fish. The Bach Ma temple is over 1000 years old and it said to be the oldest temple in the capital city and protects the four sides of Hanoi. On our tour, we visited the Hanoi Hilton, which is a prison the Vietnamese used as a POW camp during the war with America. Even Senator John McCain spent time there. After seeing all the history, we took a cyclo tour around Hanoi old Quarter. It was cool but very crazy as we navigated through the traffic. Following that tour, we walked around the streets and stopped for typical Vietnamese street food. Rice noodles served with Vietnamese, barbeque pork and deep fried spring rolls. Onto a place for different kinds of Vietnamese ice cream, and finished off with egg, coconut and salted coffees. A short walk back to our hotel and down to the pool to relax for the evening. Our tour guide Nam, was amazing explaining all the history.