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 Hanoi, Vietnam travel tales
Our customers share their travelling experiences in Hanoi, Vietnam.
Read about first hand stories on travel tips and guides, events, entertainment,shopping, food, business and transportation.
Also, you might want to read our
Central Vietnam city guide,
Halong Bay city guide,
Hanoi city guide,
Ho Chi Minh city guide,
Phan Thiet city guide,
and Hoi An city guide.
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| P Sohonie |
06 December 2004 |
Stayed at Melia Hanoi - Hanoi, Vietnam.
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The best thing about Hanoi at this time of the year is the weather. It's cool and dry. Not much to see, Ho Chi Minh's museum was closed for annual refurbishing and the one legged pagoda a big dissappoint. The fine arts museum was worth a visit. Halong Bay is a 3 hr drive, very picturesque. Restaurants - recommend Little Hanoi Cafe, Indo Chine, Emperor and Lotus at Melia Hotel.
Taxis are easily available and also enjoyed bicycle rickshaw rides in the evenings when it was wonderfully cool.
Shopping is the main focus in Hanoi. Excellent lacquerware, table linen and plenty of art galleries to choose from. Do be careful, prices vary by 100% for certain artists!! Difficult to figure out the art scene but the Vietnamese artists are worth buying. Copies are excellent, so don't hesitate to buy them.
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| P Haines |
06 December 2004 |
Stayed at Green Park Hotel - Hanoi, Vietnam.
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Hanoi is a marvellous city if you like stimulation for the senses mixed with a relaxed athmosphere. Recommend some of the restaurants and bars near the art shopping of the old quarter by St Joseph's Cathedral. Explore and enjoy!
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| M Miles |
09 November 2004 |
Stayed at De Syloia Hotel - Hanoi, Vietnam.
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Excellent if slightly expensive Vietnamese food (accompanied by very nice traditional Vietnamese music) at the Nam Phuong restaurant which is a 5 minute walk from the hotel. Wouldn't recommend the food at the equally expensive Emperor restaurant (also 5 mins from the hotel) but the bar looked very nice for a relaxing drink or two. Excellent Italian food in a very nice courtyard atmosphere at Luno d'Autumno, and don't miss an ice cream at Fanny's at the south-west corner of the lake - great flavours !
Best museums we visited were the wonderfully abstract Ho Chi Minh museum (go upstairs to see what I mean !) and the excellent Museum of Ethnology with its array of displays celebrating the vast number of diverse ethnic tribes native to today's Vietnam.
Sit back and enjoy a relaxing shave for only US$1 at any number of Hanoi's barber's shops - not only will it be fun for you, but the local staff and customers will love the show!
Can't wait to go back to Hanoi and spend more time drinking in the vibrant culture, amazing buildings and incredible friendliness of the Vietnamese people. Viva Ho Chi Minh!
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| S Kerr |
23 October 2004 |
Stayed at Hilton Hanoi Opera Hotel - Hanoi, Vietnam.
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Sua Hoa Restaurant is well worth a visit - not only good food & reasonable prices but it is run by street kids who are being trained.
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| A Kwan |
26 September 2004 |
Stayed at De Syloia Hotel - Hanoi, Vietnam.
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It is recommended that you book your airport transfer beforehand from a trusted source or from the hotel itself. We boarded a mini van which promised to take us to De Syloia but end up in the Old Quarters having a heated argument with the operator. They tried to convince us that the hotel right infront of us IS De Syloia. We remembered clearly how the hotel should look like in asia-hotels.com website and it looked nothing close to that old-looking motel he pointed out (definitely not worth the US60/night we are paying for). Furthermore, there was no signage to confirm that. Just then, someone from inside that motel emerged with a De Syloia name card and introduced himself as a staff. He said it was a high tourist season and so the hotel is fully booked (which is impossible as we had email confirmation from the hotel itself). He insisted that they bring us to another hotel under the same company whereas we insisted they bring us to the right location.
After a long struggle, we eventually get dropped off somewhere near and made our way to De Syloia on foot.
The amazing thing is that they had the namecard of De Syloia (which looked exaclty the same as the real thing after seeing one for myself at the hotel itself). They probably had prepared name cards of various major hotels to be in this
"Hijacking business".
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| K Ranade |
20 August 2004 |
Stayed at Lucky Hotel - Hanoi, Vietnam.
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Hanoi is an extremely walkable city, assuming you have the time and are up to the task of crossing the sometimes intimidating streets. I would reccomend avoiding motos and cyclos if you can. Also, a day trip to Halong Bay can be fun, but the area is extremely commercialized and totally packed with people. The scenery is still gorgeous, but there is a lot of garbage in the water. I'd reccomend going, but don't expect a pristine and secluded getaway.
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| K Byung chul |
06 August 2004 |
Stayed at Hilton Hanoi Opera Hotel - Hanoi, Vietnam.
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Nam Phuong is the best restaurant serving Vietnamese traditional food. When you visit there, never miss the 'Salad of the three different regions'. It was really marvelous! One more thing, never ever take a taxi at the street. They only think rip the foreigners off. Just give a call to Noibai to go to the airport, or use the taxies with the 'Hilton' mark in front of the hotel.
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| P Banyard |
05 August 2004 |
Stayed at Lucky Hotel - Hanoi, Vietnam.
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Handspan gave us two very good tours and seemed professional and helpful and reliable. You get what they say you are going to get - and a little bit more.
We also booked a tour with Love Planet to Sapa. The travel (train and bus) was not as described but the guide in Sapa was excellent. For restaurants, museums and the like - the Lonely Planet Guide was excellent.
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| T Lambert |
25 July 2004 |
Stayed at Lucky Hotel - Hanoi, Vietnam.
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The hotel staff recommended both the Army Museum and Ethnology Museums which were both excellent. We walked all around the old town and the French part of town easily. Good sidewalks and not crowded at all. Circumnavigating the traffic gets a bit hairy but as long as you walk through the traffic in a predictable manner, i.e. no jerky stops and starts or running then the traffic just "flows" around you. Take tea tree oil or nit/head lice spray as we encountered a large number of shops where shopkeepers were searching each others heads for the critters. One of our children brought back nits in her hair which we have been trying to eradicate for the last month!!!
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| R Ottaway (1st call) |
25 July 2004 |
Stayed at Golden Key Hotel - Hanoi, Vietnam.
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Would recommend Alfresco's spare ribs to anybody and we will go back to Ha Noi soon just for them.
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