This is actually day 1 and day 2 as we travelled from around 1pm on Saturday to around 7pm on Sunday evening, local time.

Mandy picked me up on her way to Heathrow, and we parked the car at a meet and greet car park. At the check-in desk we met up with Maxine and our Discover Adventure leader, Chris.

I had to wait for a while at the check-in desk because, for some reason, they hadn’t released all the seats, so there was nowhere for me to sit. But because of the delay, Mandy and I managed to get 2 seats together.

Once we were through security, we did a bit of shopping and then met up with some of the other people going on the trek – and another couple who were doing a different tour. Mandy and I shared a bottle of fizz to start the holiday in the right way!

The first flight to Ho Chi Minh was around 12 hours. I watched a couple of films and tried to sleep a bit.

The airport at Ho Chi Minh is like a maze with very little signposting. We had to pick out bags up and then drop them at the domestic flights terminal, but it took us a while to find it. And then it took us a while to find the departure area – but we got there eventually.

Unfortunately, our flight to Hanoi was delayed by around 3 hours, so we just sat around and drank coffee and chatted. The Vietnamese coffee is very sweet, and they use condensed milk, which makes it even sweeter.

Eventually, we boarded our flight to Hanoi, and that only took a couple of hours.

After a 45-minute drive in a minibus, we arrived at our hotel – Hanoi Botique Hotel.

We had a little bit of time before heading out for dinner, where we met up with Karen, Zoe and Gill, who had come out a few days earlier.

After a traditional Vietnamese dinner, which was delicious, we headed back to the hotel and went to bed.