Vietnam Cambodia River Cruise 2017 – Hanoi – NNs On the Wind

August 23, 2017April 28, 2019 Kathleen Ennen

AUG 21-23, 2017 Hanoi, Vietnam

After leaving DC Saturday afternoon, Aug 19, 2107, for JFK we flew JFK – Hong Kong – Hanoi, arriving Monday morning Aug 21. Long trip, loosing 12 hrs along the way. We traveled with Kathleen and David Keys and joined Anne Purvis at the Intercontinental Hanoi in the mid afternoon. We relaxed and adjusted with a lazy afternoon and dinner at the hotel.

Arising we enjoyed a terrific breakfast of many asian delights and started to feel normal again having slept a decent amount in a luxurious bed. So much better than the airline seat!!!

We decided to move over to the Sofitel Metropole Hanoi to get our bags in place a do a bit of walking and shopping. Found our first true iced Vietnamese coffee which was especially yummy in the 95 or so degree heat. The group gathered together for a late lunch of pho, BEST ever pad thai, and thai spaghetti. with cake and beer as part of the “combo”. All for about $6 each. We’re going to like this trip!!!

We officially start our 15 day tour with AmaWAterways on Wednesday, Sept 23, at 9AM. We’ll tour parts of Hanoi for the day and then depart Thursday AM for Ha Long Bay. Looking forward to our night on a junk in the bay and the reported beauty of the area. many photos to come.

Now off to see about finding a laptop charger as it appears the travel charger I got for this trip has expired, and soon won’t have any battery charge left.

Day 2 – Hanoi

After a terrific buffet breakfast we piled into one of the many coaches we were to ride on our trip and went to the prison that American POWs sarcasically dubbed the “Hanoi Hilton” during the Vietnam War. It was a difficult place when given its history. Especially the photos of John McCain taken during the time he was there, including his initial capture. The afternoon included an authentic rickshaw ride, known as “cyclo,” in Hanoi’s bustling Old Quarter. Many of the streets could be differentiated by the wares sold – there was a shoe street, and a luggage street, and an eyeglass street!!! We ended up at a theater for a traditional water puppet show.

We have traveled over the years and retired in 2017, when we started on a nine month long adventure departing in December 2017. In the past we’ve traveled to Sri Lanka, Africa (several times), Turkey, and made a number of trips to Europe, and St Lucia. Our 2015 trip to Turkey, took nearly 3 weeks to explore Istanbul, Cappadocia and the areas in proximity to Izmir.

This is a chronicle of our travels, past and present. We love to travel by trains, planes, ships, and cars – and love sailing whenever and wherever we can.

We retired from the US General Services Administration, the Federal Government’s landlord! Thom worked at planning and large scale program management of numerous projects and Kathleen, a registered professional civil engineer, was a project manager for many infrastructure and building renovation projects, including both design and construction aspects, in New England, Florida and the metro DC area. We lived in Washington DC for 12 years and upon retirement sold the house, putting a few things in a 5’x5’ storage unit and started traveling.

On return to the US in September 2018, after traveling to 21 countries, we bought a Class C RV – 2019 Thor Freedom Elite 24FE. We enjoyed our week long camping trip in New Zealand in a small converted van with few amenities, so this seemed liked a good way to tour the US. We hope to visit family along the way and as many US National Parks as possible.

UPDATE – the Covid pandemic made travel more difficult for us. We were abroad for several months when the pandemic started and returned to the US in July 2020. After several months in the RV to visit Utah and Albuquerque NM, we moved east, bought a house on the Northern Neck of Virginia, and sold the RV. For 2021 and 2022 we tended to our new house and cottage, gardens and various boats including a 18’ 1977 Marshall Sanderling catboat and a 25’ Steiger Craft Chesapeake fishing boat, and kayaks and a canoe. Hopefully travel will start again one day!!

May 2022