Day 263: Lost and found

We got up pretty late this morning and after breakfast downstairs, we set off for the train station to get our tickets to Da Nang. On the way home, we took a different route to the one we had used to get there and at one point I discovered that I had lost the map – and, consequently, that we were now lost. We continued to head in what I thought was the right direction and we soon came across a street populated by a collection of pleasant-looking cafes. We stopped at one to refresh ourselves with a beer and a mango smoothie and I suddenly remembered Google maps. We whipped out Kate's phone, but then spent some time trying to figure out exactly where the hotel was. Soon enough, however, we were back where we wanted to be. 

For lunch, we went back to our little place in the alley. As usual, we were on the late side, so there weren't many of the pork rissoles left, but the substitute ingredient was some lovely thin strips of pork belly, which I think we actually liked more. When we went to pay, the guy who helped out gave us back some money, explaining that there was a discount because we hadn't had the rissoles.

Later, as we walked to dinner, we stopped for some beers at a little street-corner bar. As this is Hanoi, the seating for the bar (which naturally consisted of kids' play sets) extended far into the street itself, so we drank our very cheap beers and played cards with motorbikes and scooters whizzing past us at rather close proximity. Set among the tables was a woman with a little charcoal brazier and some delicious pork kebabs, which we sampled and then sampled again.

When it was time for dinner, we walked back to the Little Black Duck. On the way, we came to a big strangler fig, at the base of which sat a small Vietnamese boy. As we passed by, he hissed evilly at us several times and then slunk into his parents' shop, which was a rather unsettling experience. On the other side of the tree was a woman grilling chicken's feet on skewers and they looked so good that I was almost tempted to buy some. Almost. When we got the restaurant it was empty – more often than not a deal-breaker for Kate - so we went back to New Day, where we sat next to a Vietnamese guy who now lived in Oklahoma.