Taxi ride

So we arrived into Hanoi and after a little bit of confusion at immigration (we lined up in the vietnamese citizen line, just trying to fit in with the locals) we made it through got our bags and went to find the person who was meant to be transferring us to our hostel, after 15 minutes of searching we went and brought a sim card so we could call the hostel. strangly the unstructions for how to work the sim card were all in Vietnamese which was very inconsiderate i think, but we worked it out in the end, called the hostel but they had no record that they were meant to pick us up.
we went outside and were very quickly ushered into a waiting taxi, a little apprehensive we gave them the address of the hostel. it didnt take long to realise that in Vietnam horns are more favourable than use of the breaks or doing head checks (maybe you should come to Vietnam darc, wouldnt have to do head checks) our driver pretty much beeped the horn the entire 30 minute drive, at one point we went through a 4 way intersection, our driver beeping and dozens of motor bikes coming the other way driving around us, was crazy! i saw too many crazy sites to name on that drive but some included, houses been built been held up by lots of sticks (i'll take a photo of this and post it later), people sitting in the middle of the road with slabs of meat on blankets cutting it up, a little girl on the back of a motorbike tied to her mum with a scarf, a woman carrying a stick behind her neck with large containers hanging from each end (one filled with GOLDFISH and the other filled with flowers), a person riding a motor bike with one hand and holding an umbrella with the other, a person on a motorbike with a TRACTOR tyre attached to the side of it!!! plus many many more crazy things. i wanted to tell the taxi driver to stop every 30 seconds so i could take photos, we;re about to go exploring and get some dinner now so i'll be sure to take lots of photos. its only 2.45pm here but we are just about ready for dinner and bed after only 3 or so hours sleep the past 24 hours.
hopefully i'll keep this updated as frequently as i have so far, fingers crossed the novelty wont wear off :-)
dooooooonnng

Singapore Airport

Made it to Singapore all good, hardly slept on the plane, not for lack of trying! so loud and they kept turning on the lights to bring around food and duty free things. but flight was good, i didnt get sick... we just have 5 hours to kill here then on to Hanoi!!
More updates coming soon
xoxoxox

Stir crazy

Eleven days to go and I'm already in holiday mode. I've got everything i need for the trip and everything that can be booked beforehand has been booked and paid for so I'm left sitting here twiddling my thumbs counting down days, hours, minutes until we leave. this post is a tad pointless... don't worry though guys in less then two weeks I'll be able to post something you might actually be interested in reading!

Packing List

2 pairs of black leggings
3 x dresses
1 x shorts
4 x tops (t-shirts)
3 x singlets
1 x pants
1 x cardi
1 x jumper
2x long sleeved top
1 x board shorts
1 x bathers

These are the clothes i need to survive with for the next 8 months so wish me luck! it's a bit different to what i'm used to, i still can't believe i'm going to live like a turtle for the next 8 months, carrying my life around on my back.

7 weeks to go

Went away for the long weekend to Mansfield, i used my backpack (as a trial run) and it went well, despite me packing way too many clothes, thank god i did though as it rained the whole time we were there!!! the rain was crazy and our poor tent did well to stay up, luckily despite our tent nearly falling down the first night it remained nice and dry on the inside.
Going to Mitta Mitta for the Easter weekend so will take my backpack again for that trip and try to only pack things i plan to take overseas... still not sure how i am going to survive taking only 3-4 outfits for 8 whole months!

 Me, Riki & Darcee at Craigs Hut, Mansfield