Hanoi is sensory overload in the best possible way. Vietnam's thousand-year-old capital is a city of motorbikes streaming in rivers through narrow lanes, of steaming bowls of pho served on tiny plastic stools, of crumbling French colonial villas, ancient temples, and a beautiful lake right in the middle of it all. The Old Quarter is the heart of it: a maze of streets each once dedicated to a single trade, now a glorious tangle of shops, street kitchens, and life lived loudly on the pavement. It can feel chaotic at first, and then you learn to flow with it, and it becomes one of the most rewarding cities in Asia.
For the budget traveller, Hanoi is a joy. It's one of the most affordable capital cities in the region, and Vietnam as a whole is among the best-value destinations in Asia, slightly cheaper than Thailand for food, transport and rooms. A bowl of the city's legendary pho costs a couple of pounds, a glass of fresh draught beer at a bia hoi corner is pennies, dorm beds are a few pounds, and many of Hanoi's pleasures, the lake, the Old Quarter, the colonial streets, the dawn tai chi, are completely free. The trick is to eat where the locals eat, walk where you can, and step a few streets back from the busiest tourist corners. We'll show you how.
