Flights seem to be always long and uncomfortable…..
I met up with Jörg in Istanbul with not much time (but enough for a beer) before the long flight to Hanoi left.
An uneventful flight – many of the passengers were quite pushy and rude, and upon landing a whole bunch of passengers started getting up and collecting their hand-luggage and trying to go to the bathroom while we were still taxiing on the runway and on the way to the gate – no amount of messages over the PA system convinced them to sit down….
Immigration was not a problem, as we had the visas in advance already – there was a whole area set aside for people applying on arrival – no idea how long that takes, but I am glad we arranged our beforehand.
Luggage took forever to get out – mine came first and then a long wait for Jörgs stuff.
In-between we met some guy from Sweden/Norway(?) who also was biking SE Asia (his planned route is to Singapore). His bike box came out in much worse condition than ours, but everything seemed to be OK – he was busy rebuilding his bike outside when we left.
Our pick-up service underestimated how much space we required for the bikes (despite me mentioning it to them twice) – getting the bikes into the vehicle was a tight fit (and tighter for me – sitting on the backseat squished up against the car door).
But we got to the hotel in one piece – a pleasant new hotel within walking distance of the major sights of downtown Hanoi (Riverside Boutique Hotel) – 75€ for 3 nights for 2 people (with breakfast) – a reasonable deal .
A quick dinner at the local street food soup joint with the local drunks rounded out a very long day…