BRR it's cold in Hanoi

Because it's so cold at the moment in Hanoi, we decided to do as much sight seeing as possible. That way we can hurry up and get back to some sun, which is feeling very far away. First of all we walked to the Ho Chi Minh Museum. It isn't always open to the public, and today was no exception. There are always armed guards surrounding the grounds, which has a white line painted on the floor with signs saying 'No Enrty' spaced 15 or so metres apart. It's obvious that this place is of great importance to the government because of how clean and up kept it is. It's a shame we couldn't get in, because apparently the building contains Ho Chi Minh's embalmed body.

Just around the corner from the Ho Chi Minh Museum is the One Pillar Pagoda. It's a small temple in the middle of a pond, held above the water by one pillar. It was built in 1049 by Emporer Lý Thái Tông. The story goes that a monk told the Emporer to build a Pagoda with a single pillar in the middle of a pond because he saw it in a dream!

Next we walked to try and find a pond hidden in the residential area of the Old Quarter, which has some remains of a B52 Bomber that the Vietnamese Defense shot down in the 1970's. After reading about it online, it seems it's renowned for being difficult to find, and the rumours were true. We got completely lost in a maze of tiny back streets, getting some funny looks from locals who were clearly thinking 'another lost tourist'. Eventually we stumbled across the pond which was a lot smaller then we were expecting. It had been partly drained, as there was some work being carried out, so we got to see more of the B52 than most, as it is normally partly submerged