Huong of Vidotour met me in Hanoi’s Movenpick lobby at 7:15 am, and we left for the airport directly in order to safely catch my 9:20 am flight to Danang (which is where I’m posting this from). I forget the driver’s name but he’s as cool and smooth as Huong. Scooter traffic is heavy in Hanoi around 7:30 am, and it gets a lot heavier an hour later.


Vietnam Airlines flights from Hanoi to Danang take exactly an hour.

The Vietnamese Dong vs. the US dollar is about 20,833 to 1. Seriously. So a lunch that might cost $5 or $6 US costs about 100,000 or 120,000 dong. 500,000 Vietnamese dong are worth about $24 dollars, so 2 million dong is worth $96 clams, give or take.

Huong leading me out of the Movenpick before jumping into the van.