Vietnam My first impressions of Vietnam Travel to Vietnam 0 (0)Let's leave Thailand's political problems aside for a moment (the red shirts are live on TV as I write, 3 leaders talking to the Prime Minister) and start this Vietnam review.Vietnam (variants Vietnam, Vietnam, Vietnam and Viet Nam), occupies an area of 690km2 and has about 86 million inhabitants. It is bordered by China to the north, Laos to the west and Cambodia to the southwest. The country is more than 1600 km long, its capital is Hanoi but the largest city is Ho Chi Minh City, still known as Saigon (from the time of French Indochina).Officially it is a socialist republic, but in reality it is a communist government where there is only one party allowed…That's a brief summary. Our stay lasted 15 days, which is relatively short considering the size of the country... But we had to make do.The first impressions are rather good, it is a very beautiful country, but the lack of time meant that we had to review our schedule and were not able to see some of the "must-see" places in the country, so we will have to come back to it...[EDIT 2015: thing done this year in the north !]On the right, here is our completed circuit:Arrival in Ho Chi Minh City (HCM for short)Mui bornDalatNha Trang, Hoi AnHueAnd finally Hanoi (with a detour to Halong Bay of course). For this we took what they call open buses (open tour, they translate into French...) which comes down to choosing a route with the cities crossed, but there is no day constraint, the dates are to be confirmed 48 hours before and hop you can go to the next stage, on the other hand no choice on the times, inconvenience which made us change our program, because originally, we were supposed to go to Sapa and Tam Coc also, but in hindsight it is obviously not so bad because already there it was speed... (although there would not have been Nha Trang which we could have done without if we had been able to do as planned)Here is the link to the organization where we bought the tickets (on site): https://www.thesinhtourist.vn/I was surprised by the radical change and the other Asian countries I have already visited, it is always impressive to see significant differences from one country to another, but in a way, it is so much the better, that is what makes the charm (or not) of a country. And the first shock was the driving. A disaster making the Thais seem like drivers worthy of English phlegm. It is nonsense to sum up simply. No real rules, no real politeness between them, it is "move over I'll pass" and it translates into an incessant concerto of horns, a teeming number of 2 wheels (majority compared to cars) which do not necessarily respect red lights (but let's be honest, let's say a good 90% respect them anyway) but surprisingly enough not a single accident, it happens naturally.Even though we all thought we were going to die with a crazy bus driver who clearly had a pressing need to relieve his bladder (and I'm not kidding! Because after stopping at the designated place for the break, he drove more relaxed...). Even though it comes from all sides and you have to cross the crowded streets, even though I dared to drive a motorbike several times, there are no incidents to report, proof that it is doable, but damn more difficult and stressful than in Thailand.As for the population, there are of course lovely people, but also a tendency to be a bit rude or at best, indifferent towards us, pushing and shoving to get through. Afterwards, from our experience, they are like that among themselves too…This is how to summarize our impressions of this country, which has not finished showing us all its beauty and its riches, because we obviously intend to return there in order to complete the parts not visited, namely for the most part the whole North. We were still happy to return and appreciate the "calm" of Bangkok and its home.The sorting of the photos is not yet completely finished and for technical reasons, I cannot upload the first photos allowing me to publish the first articles, so a little patience will be required... I know, I often ask for patience. Did you like the article? Vote on the article Note globale 0 / 5. Number of votes: 0 No votes yet. Be the first to rate this article! Did you like the article? Follow me on social media Directions Mind 0 0 Roman 28/03/2010
