Where Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon) is busy with new growth geared toward achieving total relevance in the global marketplace, Hanoi’s atmosphere speaks more to a reverence for the quiet wisdom that comes with the passage of time and much experience. Though Hanoi’s population is young and savvy—educated about the world through the Internet and foreign travel—many visitors to this dynamic and welcoming city remark on the sense of age and solidity the city exudes. Hanoi’s modern architecture and conveniences are built around a core of ancient streets, foods, culture, and habits of living in a harmonious blend that reveres the old while welcoming the new. Hanoi may just be your favorite destination in the vibrant tapestry that is Vietnam. Read more

Where Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon) is busy with new growth geared toward achieving total relevance in the global marketplace, Hanoi’s atmosphere speaks more to a reverence for the quiet wisdom that comes with the passage of time and much experience. Though Hanoi’s population is young and savvy—educated about the world through the Internet and foreign travel—many visitors to this dynamic and welcoming city remark on the sense of age and solidity the city exudes.
Hanoi’s modern architecture and conveniences are built around a core of ancient streets, foods, culture, and habits of living in a harmonious blend that reveres the old while welcoming the new. Hanoi may just be your favorite destination in the vibrant tapestry that is Vietnam.

The truly ancient city of Hanoi has gone by dozens of different names over the centuries. The city’s current name was bestowed in 1831 by Nguyen emporer, Minh Mang, to denote its position nestled into a curve of the long and mighty Red River’s right bank, with the large West Lake bordering the city’s northern boundary. A capital city for nearly a millennium in the kingdoms that encompassed North Vietnam, Hanoi is now capital of a reunified Vietnam.

When the French invaded and colonized Vietnam in the 1830s, Hanoi became part of the Tonkin region of Indochina, and you can still find a strong French influence in the city’s French Quarter, with it’s stately French architecture, preponderance of cafes, and availability of Hanoi’s incredibly popular coffee and crusty baguettes.

When the French were forced to leave Vietnam during World War II, the Japanese occupied Indochina from December 1941 to 1942, until they were expelled by General Ho Chi Minh’s communist army, the Viet Minh. The French moved into the vacuum that retreating Japanese forces created until they were again forced to leave, with North Vietnam declaring its independence in 1945.

In 1946, friction between the Viet Minh and French occupiers sparked the Battle of Hanoi, which became the first of many battles in the First Indochina War that ended in 1952. When North Vietnam won the Vietnam War in 1975 (called the American War in Vietnam), Hanoi became the capital of the reunified northern and southern parts of the country.

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