Vietnam and Cambodia
Hanoi, Old Quarter Rickshaw Tour
The Old Quarter of Hanoi is filled with narrow, crowded streets, all lined with every sort of shop and restaurant you can imagine. AMAWaterways put together a rickshaw tour to explore those streets.
Here are some photos:
Here I am, ready for my rickshaw ride. In Hanoi, rickshaws are no longer the human-drawn carts that we all saw in the cartoons of our youth, but are instead “cyclo-rickshaws” (my name for them—I never heard them referred to as anything but “rickshaws”). These cyclo-rickshaws have the back end of a normal bicycle grafted to a canopy-covered bench seat with a bicycle wheel at either end of the seat. The entire seat, canopy, and front wheels move with the steering! Luckily, they never go very fast!
All of the rickshaws in our group were driven (ridden?) by small, wiry, mostly gray-haired gentlemen. Believe me, these guys were fit! Not an ounce of fat between them! I suppose pedaling tourists around all day in these contraptions would be a serious cardio work-out!
I also learned quickly that these cyclo-rickshaws have no suspension. The bumps—and there are lots of those in Hanoi’s Old Quarter—go straight through the wheels, through the seat’s thin padding, and straight up one’s spine. Despite my increasingly sore rear, though, it was all part of the giggles—the maybe 30-minute rickshaw ride was a blast!
Natalie and Prisbe, fellow Sail with Seth travelers—and my new friends—are also ready for their rickshaw rides!
We formed quite a line of rickshaws winding our way through the Old Quarter’s streets. There had to be 15-20 of us.
It was sometimes impossible for those of us near the back of the queue of rickshaws to keep up with those in the front. Traffic would close up around us and we would slowly creep forward. And then traffic would open up—that’s relative, we were still wheel-to-wheel—and my driver would stamp hard on the pedals and we would speed to catch up. I really enjoyed those bursts! Sitting in the very front of the rickshaw, though, gave me a very up-close-and-personal view of the bobbing and weaving of Hanoi traffic! Going through intersections was especially exciting! I think I involuntarily pulled my feet back a few times.
Eventually our rickshaw ride ended, dropping us somewhere in the middle of the Old Quarter. We were all lost, but Rose, our exceptional tour guide, saved us. She led us on a short walking tour of the Old Quarter, through narrower and narrower streets, all the while telling us about the neighborhoods and life in them. Here she’s pointing out a restaurant that we might want to consider for dinner later.
You may notice that we’re walking in the street. There are sidewalks in Hanoi, but in many places you can’t use them because they are filled with parked motorbikes. It’s almost universal for merchants along the streets to rent parking space to motorbikes on the sidewalks in front of their shops. No, it’s not legal to do this, but the local policemen look the other way—provided they have been compensated for their inattention. The bottom line is that you have to walk in the street. Not to worry—the motorbikes and cars will give a friendly beep-beep to let you know they are there and then pass you with an inch or two to spare.
Did I mention the streets got narrower and narrower?