Post by Jon Parker on Jun 15, 2016 3:36:10 GMT 7
Taking a few week as a gap period after quiting my job, I had 1 week to travel to Hanoi and Sapa (Vietnam) with no fixed plan in May, coz’ my plan is to do what I saw it should be done while in the city. I stayed near the lake of Returned Sword. One of the funny things but sometimes also irritating me was that students here want to practice English with foreigners, so they go to the lake and find any foreigners they can to talk to them. I was no exception, LOL. however, this experience is not so bad, I enjoyed it somehow 
Oh, but the little interesting and useful thing was when I met 3 Vietnamese girls while wandering around the lake. They were developing an app named Hanoi Audio Guide to replace the normal guide with incredibly cheap price (of course, it’s an app, not a real man). This app helped a solo travel like me a lot, and I think it works with travelers who don’t want to find a real guide to visit the city but still want to taste the city like a local. I tried for free with some parts of the app, then continued buying the rest to fulfill 4 days of mine in Hanoi. Unfortunately they don’t have it in Sapa =)) These girls were very friendly and helpful when giving advices while in Vietnam =))) Their app showed me several hidden things that normal travellers would miss if they only did research online about Vietnam travel, such as seeing the life of people under Long Bien bridge, eating local food at Dong Xuan street (not Dong Xuan market), enjoying local beer at Ta Hien beer corner, visiting Museum of Ethnology and watching water puppet show at weekends. I followed their food tour route to enjoy the local food at local restaurant as well
4 days in Hanoi might be my best memories so far in my travel journey
But watch out the weather, it's super HOTTTTT this time =)))
Oh, but the little interesting and useful thing was when I met 3 Vietnamese girls while wandering around the lake. They were developing an app named Hanoi Audio Guide to replace the normal guide with incredibly cheap price (of course, it’s an app, not a real man). This app helped a solo travel like me a lot, and I think it works with travelers who don’t want to find a real guide to visit the city but still want to taste the city like a local. I tried for free with some parts of the app, then continued buying the rest to fulfill 4 days of mine in Hanoi. Unfortunately they don’t have it in Sapa =)) These girls were very friendly and helpful when giving advices while in Vietnam =))) Their app showed me several hidden things that normal travellers would miss if they only did research online about Vietnam travel, such as seeing the life of people under Long Bien bridge, eating local food at Dong Xuan street (not Dong Xuan market), enjoying local beer at Ta Hien beer corner, visiting Museum of Ethnology and watching water puppet show at weekends. I followed their food tour route to enjoy the local food at local restaurant as well
4 days in Hanoi might be my best memories so far in my travel journey
But watch out the weather, it's super HOTTTTT this time =)))