A few street scenes along the way...
First on the list was to see Ho Chi Minh's lovely soviet-style mausoleum and final resting place. Sort of. Normally his embalmed body is there and can be viewed, but from September from December he's out for "maintenance". Seriously.
This was as close as we were allowed to get.
There was what appeared to be a rehearsal of a show going on nearby, everything was still decked out for that 1000 year celebration.
We took a walk around part of West Lake...
Where I sort of got us lost for about an hour, but Kim was very patient with me and didn't complain a bit. Sweaty and starting to get blisters, we eventually made it to the One Pillar Pagoda.
There goes Kim, breaking the rules again...
At the Ho Chi Minh museum, more un-inspiring Soviet-era architecture...
God blessing capitalism, the "I Love Hanoi" stuff was being sold about every 10 feet. This girl was willing to pose for a picture until I declined to pay her, whereas she chased me all the way to the Temple of Literature ticket booth, demanding I at least buy a sticker. I did not.
Some of the Temple of Literature:
There were lots of turtles that people kept patting on the head. We had no idea why (luck maybe?), but when in Rome...
That evening we went and picked up my paintings that I had commissioned a couple of days earlier. I stopped by a little ship with a couple of printed out pictures and viola! Two days and $100 later, I had two gorgeous oil paintings.
The evening light show was a little lame...
But the water puppet show was fun! Sort of like a regular puppet show but they were manipulated wires under the water instead of strings from above.
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The morning of our last day, I went outside to try to capture a few of the motorcycle pictures. They fell into three categories.
Child Endangerment:
How Much Crap Can You Haul:
Goodbye Hanoi, I'll miss the Pho but not the exhaust!
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