I had three weeks to spend in Vietnam. I'd planned the trip for months and couldn't decide whether to start in Hanoi or Ho Chi Minh City. Then I checked flights and Hanoi was about 150 quid cheaper, so that solved that problem. I booked it and didn't really know what to expect beyond what I'd seen on a few travel blogs and some Instagram posts.
I arrived on a Tuesday afternoon in April. The airport doors opened and I walked straight into a wall of heat. Not just warm but properly hot, and the humidity meant I was sweating before I'd even cleared customs. The smell hit me too - diesel, street food cooking, something else I couldn't place. By the time I'd got my bag and sorted a taxi to the Old Quarter, my shirt was soaked through.
My hotel was up four flights of narrow stairs in a building that looked like it might collapse but probably wouldn't. The room was small, basic, and had a window that looked out onto a street full of motorbikes. Thousands of them. I'm not exaggerating. The sound was constant. A low rumble mixed with honking and the high pitched whine of scooters revving. I thought it would drive me mad but by the second day I stopped really hearing it.
I was tired so I went to bed early. I woke up at 5am because it was already light and hot and the street noise had shifted from motorbikes to something else. Street vendors. People talking. Water being hosed down onto the pavement. I couldn't fall back asleep so I got up and walked to Hoan Kiem Lake.
It was completely different at that hour. The water was still and grey and reflected the sky perfectly. There were old men doing tai chi on the grass. A few other tourists taking photos. No chaos. No crowds. Just quiet. I bought coffee from a vendor and sat on a bench and watched the sun come up. The light turned the water gold. It was genuinely peaceful.
The Jade Mountain Temple was nearby so I walked over there while it was still early. There's a narrow wooden bridge that leads out to it and the bridge is actually a bit rickety which adds to the experience. The temple was cool inside, which was a relief. An older woman was burning incense and praying. The air was thick with smoke. It smelled like sandalwood or something similar. There were Buddha statues and golden decorations but nothing too ornate. It felt real, like actual people came here to pray, not just tourists. Entry was 30,000 dong which is basically two quid. Worth it for the peace and quiet before the city properly woke up.
By the time I left the temple it was 7am and the city had already transformed. The streets were packed. Motorbikes everywhere, people carrying things, shops opening up, the smell of food cooking. I hadn't eaten yet so I decided to find breakfast.
I wandered into the Old Quarter properly and got completely lost, which was fine because everything looked interesting anyway. Narrow streets, buildings stacked on top of each other, cables running everywhere, stuff hanging outside shops. I found a small place called Robun Tea. It was just a shop front, barely wider than my shoulders. A young guy was working there and he barely looked up when I walked in. I pointed at something in the window and sat down on a plastic stool.
What he brought me was a bowl of noodles in broth with fresh herbs on the side. Basil, coriander, mint, a lime wedge. The broth was amazing, clearly been simmering for hours. The noodles were soft and the whole thing tasted like fish sauce and meat and something deeply savoury. He charged me 40,000 dong. I ate it quickly like everyone else was doing around me. Slurping loudly is apparently the correct way. I got broth all down my shirt. Great way to start the day.
After breakfast I spent a few hours just walking. The Old Quarter is genuinely chaotic. There are no big streets with names you'd recognize. It's just alleyways and tiny streets and you never know what's going to be around the corner. I passed temples with incense smoke pouring out. Markets where people were selling vegetables or clothes or phone chargers. Restaurants where locals were eating. Coffee shops packed with young people. Street vendors squatting down selling something I couldn't identify. It should have been stressful but it was actually fascinating. Everyone was just doing their thing and they didn't care that I was a foreigner walking around taking photos.
By midday I was exhausted and the heat was properly intense. Maybe 35 degrees. The humidity made it feel worse. My clothes were soaked through with sweat, at least it covered my stains from breakfast. I found a small courtyard tucked off a side street with vines growing up the walls and a few cafe tables. I ordered coffee. This time it came in the traditional way, in a metal filter that drips slowly into a cup with sweetened condensed milk at the bottom. Strong and sweet and bitter all at once. I sat there for a couple of hours just people watching. Young Vietnamese couples holding hands. Old men playing chess. Street vendors setting up. Women carrying vegetables. Tourists like me looking completely lost. Solo travel does something weird to your sense of time. The days stretch out. But they feel more intentional somehow. You notice things you'd miss if you were rushing around with someone else. I just sat and watched and drank my coffee and the world moved around me.
On day two I was more strategic. I got up early and went to the museums. The colonial history is everywhere in Hanoi and you should actually understand it if you're going to be there. The buildings, the way the city is laid out, all of that comes from the French occupation. The museums are in these dark wooden buildings with careful interiors and air conditioning which I was grateful for. There were artifacts and photographs and explanations of the war and colonial period. Heavy stuff. It took a few hours but it actually made me understand the city better. Why it's organized the way it is. Why there's this mixture of old French architecture and Soviet stuff and modern developments all crammed together.
For lunch I found another small restaurant and ordered a big bowl of fresh vegetables and herbs. Lettuce, more basil, coriander, mint, some vegetables I didn't recognize. Just herbs and vegetables in a white bowl. It came with rice and a few sauces. I realized this was a normal lunch in Hanoi, the kind of thing people eat every day. Fresh, simple, cheap. The vegetables tasted better than anything I get at home. Everything tasted fresher. I think it's because it's all local and probably picked that morning. Spring was the right time to go because everything was in season.
The weather stayed hot the whole time I was there. Humid. Sometimes it would look like rain was coming but it never actually rained while I was around. The temperature at midday was brutal. 35 to 38 degrees. Nobody moves fast in the middle of the day. Shops close. People retreat inside or sit in the shade. It's too hot to do anything. By late afternoon it was more bearable and that's when things picked up again. Markets would fill up. People would come out. Restaurants would get busy.
I spent an entire evening just walking around the street food markets. There are areas where dozens of vendors set up with small plastic stools and tables. You just wander around and point at what looks good. I had grilled fish on a stick, which was incredible. Skewers of meat, spring rolls, sticky rice with mango, sugar cane juice being pressed fresh while I watched. Everything was cheap. Like less than a quid for most things. The vendors knew I was a foreigner after I said my first word but they didn't treat me differently. They just cooked for me the same way they cooked for everyone else. There's something really nice about that.
On day three I took a day trip to Ha Long Bay. My hotel arranged it through some tour company. We left early in the morning, maybe 6am, and it was a two hour drive north. Sitting in traffic in Hanoi for two hours was an experience in itself. The traffic is genuinely mad. Motorbikes everywhere, weaving between cars, no real rules, people just somehow managing not to crash into each other constantly. I have no idea how it works. Don't try to drive there if you've never driven in Southeast Asia before. You will die.
Ha Long Bay was different from Hanoi completely. Limestone mountains rise straight up out of the water. Turquoise water. It's actually as beautiful as the photos. We got on a boat and cruised between the rock formations. Other tourists were doing the same thing. It felt a bit touristy but it's also genuinely spectacular so you can't really complain. We stopped and got in a kayak and paddled under some of the rock formations. The water was warm. The limestone was massive up close. It's hard to explain how big the scale is until you're actually there.
I was sunburned as hell by the end of the day. Didn't apply enough sunscreen. The sun reflects off the water and you burn faster than you think. The boat ride back to Hanoi felt long. I was tired and burnt and hot. By the time I got back to the hotel I just went to bed.
On my last day I didn't do much. Actually that's not quite true. I went to the Military Museum because I kept walking past it and it seemed like the kind of thing you should do when you're trying to understand a place's history. The building was imposing, Soviet-looking. Inside it was massive, full of weapons and planes and photos and displays about the wars. It was heavy going, honestly. Tank wreckage, anti-aircraft guns, photographs of soldiers and destruction. But it mattered. You can't really understand Hanoi without understanding what it went through. The war with America, the earlier stuff with the French, all of it's right there in the exhibits. I spent a few hours going through it and by the end I was exhausted but it had given me a lot to think about.
After the museum I went back to the Old Quarter and wandered around again. Found a different coffee place. Ate pho for lunch. Sat and watched the city. The traffic, the people, the chaos. I actually felt a bit sad leaving, which surprised me because the first day I thought it was going to drive me mental.
The truth about Hanoi is that it's loud and crowded and chaotic and the traffic is absolutely mental and it's hot and humid and overwhelming. But it's also real in a way that a lot of tourist destinations aren't. People aren't performing for you. They're just living. The food is incredible and cheap. The history is written into everything. The temples are genuine. And somehow after a few days you stop being bothered by the noise and the heat and you just kind of sink into it.
What I remember most clearly is sitting in that courtyard cafe drinking coffee that tasted nothing like coffee at home. The way my clothes were constantly soaked with sweat. The sound of thousands of motorbikes creating this constant background noise. The taste of noodles in broth that had clearly been simmering for hours. How kind people were even when I couldn't speak Vietnamese. The way the light looked on the water at sunrise. The absolute insanity of the traffic. How expensive things weren't. The smell of incense in the temple. The limestone mountains rising out of turquoise water.
Would I go back? Yeah. Definitely. There's a lot more to see and I felt like I only scratched the surface. The heat would probably get to me again. The traffic would probably stress me out again. But I'd deal with it because the city is actually interesting and the people are good and the food is brilliant. That's worth a lot of discomfort.