Luxury Travel Testimonial - Part 9: Old Hanoi

We had scheduled one more day in Hanoi in order to take our time and visit the old city and do some last minute shopping before leaving Hanoi for Canada the next day.

This time we stayed at the Sheraton Hanoi. This is a very luxurious hotel on the Hoan Kiem Lake. It has a beautiful swimming pool, garden and luxury rooms (Picture 45).

The advantage of this hotel is that it is close to the lake and also closer to the airport if you happen to have an early morning flight departing from Hanoi ( the airport is quite far from the city and there is a lot of traffic). The disadvantage of the hotel's location is that it quite far from the main sights and the old city. The best bet would be the Sofitel or Melia hotel for Hanoi.

Old Hanoi is a class in itself for an Asian capital, there may not be anything like it. The architecture is special in that it has preserved the old style, not like Ho Chi Minh City. The bustle, street vendor activity and sidewalk restaurants are forever in motion. There are also excellent French and Vietnamese restaurants.

The next day was day 65 for us, we had to leave Vietnam and Indo China. We were anxious to get home, but we know we would also miss the countries, the people and the wonderful experience. What made the departure a bit easier to swallow was the fact that Luxury Travel had the same driver who we had first met 25 days earlier in Hanoi pick us up at the Hanoi Sheraton and take us to the airport. And so we have a warm memory of a friend who waved us good by as we left (Picture 46).

One more reason why we highly recommend Luxury Travel.

Arnold August

• Part 1: HCMC, Mekong , Phu Quoc
• Part 2: Cambodia
• Part 3: Central Highlands & Nha Trang Beach
• Part 4: Center of Vietnam along the coast
• Part 5: Hanoi and Red River Cruise
• Part 6: Halong Bay
• Part 7: Sapa and North West Vietnam
• Part 8: Laos
• Part 9: Old Hanoi