Hanoi Old Quarter

Hanoi is a beautiful city, decked in autumn colours and red Vietnam flags. The streets are lined with beautiful trees and are full of crazy motorcyclists! Crossing the road may be a little unnerving at first, but you soon get used to it. Walking around the Old quarter is a treat, just to see the many temples and the lake at the centre of the town.


Museum of Ethnology
It has artifacts and depictions of the lifestyles of the different Vietnamese ethnic groups.

Old Quarter and streets of Hanoi

Hoan Kiem Lake

Hoan Kiem Lake in the Old Quarter, is a calm and beautiful place to walk about or relax. The place was decorated with balloons to celebrate the lunar new year. In the middle of the lake is an islet reached by a red wooden bridge. On the islet stands a temple called the Ngoc Son Temple, or the Temple of the Jade Mountain.

Bridge called "The Flood of Morning Sunlight"

Ngoc Son temple

Local people burn fake money to send to their ancestors in the other world

Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum and house

School outing

Temples

One Pillar Pagoda

Temple of Literature

A dragon supports the incense stick holder

Lotus is the national flower of Vietnam

Local people praying and making incense offerings at the Hanoi Tran Quoc Pagoda

Trekking in Sa Pa

Sa Pa is a beautiful town set in the northern mountains of Vietnam, near the border with China. It takes an overnight train journey to get there from Hanoi. From the Lao Cai train station, it is a winding road up to Sa Pa town. I stayed there for 2 days, and trekked through terraced rice fields and villages of the ethnic minorities. My trekking guide, Maya (her real name is Gia, pronounced as Za) belonged to one of the ethnic minorities herself, and took me to visit her village and a local house.

Love Waterfall

By road from the Lao Cai train station up to Sa Pa

Hoang Lien National Park

Misty mountains

Trekking to the Love waterfall

My local guide, Maya, who belongs to the Black H'mong ethnic minority

The hill town of Sa Pa is chilly and beautiful in winter. The Town Square is a large empty area, where you could walk, sit and relax, or eat delicious Vietnamese food. I had all my meals at an excellent cafe called Gecko.

Sa Pa town

Town square

A village school

The rice terraces are brown, dry and misty in winter. In the summer months, they look beautiful in bright green and yellow. The trek took us through several villages, where we saw the inhabitants preparing food, children playing about and vendors selling local handicrafts.

Terraced rice fields, in the mountains of Sa Pa

Walking through local villages in the Muong Hoa valley

Dyed cloth used by the Black H'mong ethnic minority

Young girls from ethnic minority communities

Going to school

The Red Dao ethnic minority - according to an old custom, married women have to shave their heads and eyebrows