We spent a couple more days wandering around Hanoi with no real itinerary. It’s a great place to walk out your door and just keep choosing left, right, or straight.

A friendly smile and a wave. If we received any reaction at all to a camera being pointed in someone’s direction, it was like this.

Even the pigeons know how to cross a street full of motorcycles. Walk right out and keep a steady pace and allow the drivers to go around you. If you stop and try to dodge you’ll definitely cause an accident.

Nobody in Hanoi seems one bit bothered by this sort of thing. They are 100% comfortable with pulling up and blocking the entire sidewalk.

Lest you think it’s nothing but small motorcycles around Hanoi.

Online translation gives me: Lease Feathers, or Rental Property. So, I guess these roosters are lovers, not fighters.

Not really sure what this bamboo setup was all about.

Even when it would be easy to park so you wouldn’t block the entire sidewalk, they choose option B.

The Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum. It was closed for the holidays during our visit.

There isn’t a lot of wasted space in Hanoi. The train tracks are a prime example. I don’t know when the first person thought, “Hey, what if we turned the back of the house into a cafe and let people sit six inches from the train?” But it probably wasn’t long before all the neighbors got onboard with the idea. Now it’s a huge tourist draw. It’s a great place to have a beer and maybe lose a limb.

In fact, the government shut the place down for a while, as tourist deaths were not at all uncommon. Eventually the local businesses banded together and promised to do a better job of protecting people. They reopened, and now they blow whistles and hustle people off the track when the trains come (which is only three or four times a day).

I have to say, it’s deceptive how quickly the train goes from seeming far off to blasting past you. I can just imagine the stress the conductors feel when they drive through here.

You also wouldn’t think watching a couple trains go by would be all that much fun, but it made for a nice night out. It’s a great place to people watch.