October 5, 2025
Our boat evacuation day meant another travel day, back to Hanoi, is upon us. The hotel that Jenny got for us 15 minutes from the boat dock in Halong City was very nice so we planned to spend the morning there and leave just before noon.
I woke up early and continued to try to catch up on blog posts with my new method being to write the current ones as they happen and squeeze in a catch up September post as I have time. The boys eventually woke up and joined Kayleen and I but the whole apartment was very cold from us dropping the AC so much overnight since the room was so hot when we arrived. They demanded to snuggle to keep warm until it was time to head to breakfast. Ollie continued to enjoy his veggie sushi rolls, along with some pancakes for breakfast.
After breakfast Kayleen headed to the hotel gym while I started home school with the boys. Unfortunately before we could start we had to get help from the hotel to get back into our adjoining rooms. I had taken the key for the boys door when we left for breakfast but it wouldn’t work when we returned. The front desk gave us a new key and sent someone with us back to the room, which I thought was totally unnecessary but ended up being very much needed.
Once back at the room the new key also did not work. The hotel employee, who only spoke Vietnamese, used his computer to unlock the door which we then realized was locked from the inside only lock. Likely why the key card was rejecting opening the door in the first place. I asked him to unlock the room next door and he looked at me like I was insane. He eventually did it and opened the door very slowly yelling “HELLOOOOO” into the room. Once we entered and he saw the open connecting door he understood and laughed.
Kayleen returned and I took my turn at the gym while she finished home school and gave the boys a shower. This hotel bathroom puts the one in Hanoi to shame so we had to shower them here to give their hair a good washing. We closed up the suitcases and headed down to the lobby to meet our driver back to Hanoi. We didn’t get to explore the area much but from our view it felt oddly familiar to the landscape of Atlantic City. A city on the ocean with scattered high-rise buildings but newer and nicer than Atlantic City. There was one casino but like all casinos in Vietnam, they are only for foreigners and you need to show a passport to enter.
The ride back gave us time to listen to more Harry Potter and Lenny further engaged with Roald Dahl stories. We stopped for lunch at a Vietnamese version of a rest stop where we struggled to find something to eat. The boys ended up with a sausage, and luckily some ketchup, and I had five mini crunchy loafs of bread with a small amount of mince meat in each. Kayleen stuck to a juice and some nuts.
After resettling in our hotel and spending some time relaxing in the room we decided to venture out. The plan was to walk to Train Street to get dinner and hopefully see a train pass by. We had seen a lot of motor bikes on the streets but this 20 minute walk to Train Street really showed us how many there are. A ton of people where out for the night before the Mid-Autumn Festival so the sidewalks had become motor bike parking lots. I think this is fairly normal but not to this extreme. The only place to walk was in the road next to the sidewalk with motor bikes beeping and zipping by. Not the most pleasant walk but definitely an adventure.
Crossing at the intersections is more art than science. You wait for a small gap in traffic and then just go, if you are short it seems recommended you put your arm up in the air so the motor bikes see you and make an effort to avoid you! We made it to Train Street unscathed, but very hot. After walking down the tracks we found a small restaurant, they are all small, that had mildly working air-conditioning and a bunch of fans. We sat inside and ordered food while we waited for a train.
Lenny noticed a big map of Vietnam on the wall with a star on Hanoi. He yelled out that it was because Hanoi is the capital of Vietnam! We were stunned that he put that together which made him even more proud. Shortly after our food came we got word that a train was approaching. The employees of the restaurants and cafes that line the tracks double as safety patrol when a train passes. They fold up all the tables and chairs on the side of the tracks without buildings, make those people stand in the restaurant, and usher anyone walking on the track into the restaurant until the train passes by.
The train that comes by is not a cute little train, it is a massive locomotive with roughly 50 commuter cars behind it. It comes within a few feet of the buildings and tables. A few days after we were there a few tables were too close and the train sent them flying everywhere. It was really cool to see but also a disaster waiting to happen with the current system.
We saw a second train pass before we started our walk back towards the hotel, but this one came from the other direction! On our walk we got ice cream at a little store front that was being run by a young boy with his little sister sitting on a stool next to him. The boys each got a giant Oreo ice cream and Kayleen and I shared a coconut one. I asked the boy how old he was and he told me 12. Ollie too was impressed that this boy was running the shop, making the ice creams, dealing with all the money, and watching his sister! He said, “Dad, we should give that boy a tip.” I agreed and made sure to do so before leaving.
We headed to the hotel and stopped just before it at the street that had been turned into a market for the Mid-Autumn Festival. It was filled with kids toys, different shaped lanterns, and candy. If we thought the American toy market was heavy on weapons Vietnam surely beat it. The amount of different gun toys was insane and after that were the piles of swords. It was so crowded we quickly realized we didn’t want to be there and after a brief attempt at getting some candy by Oliver we headed back to the hotel for bed.
