Picked up from DaNang airport by a chap who thought he might challenge Daniel Ricciardo for a spot on the next Formula 1 race. He screamed to a halt at this DaNang beach for us to get out and take a photo.....
What is it with the posing in this country? ⬇
The beach was nice enough with lovely white sand, but the water was a little brown and murky for my liking. We sure are spoilt in Australia with our beaches.
Let me just start by saying one thing.....
I LOVE HOI AN!
I just love it. It's my most favourite place in Vietnam that I have visited thus far. It is such a beautiful town that even during the war, both sides - the North and the South agreed that they would not bomb Hoi An to preserve it's historic beauty..... And what a beauty she is! The buildings are incredibly old and there are some that have you wondering how the roof is being held up.
The streets are lined with colourful lanterns that are lit up at night which gives the place an more magical feeling.
Hoi An sits on the Thu Bon River which is a lifeline for the town. There are hundreds of fishing boats and nets catching fish old school. It's great to watch them fling the nets out from their boats that are big enough for 2 people.
The people are friendly and there is a welcomed sense of calm here that you don't get in the bigger cities and..... the shops are different!
After spending time in Hanoi and Nha Trang we have craved something..... anything different. I just don't understand how the sellers make any money by selling the exact same thing as the 6 shops either side of them. We've spent the last week saying "If just one person had a different idea - they'd be a million-dong-aire (which I realise isn't a huge amount of money), but they'd have tourists (us) swarming to their stall.
So on our first jaunt through the shops of the Hoi An Ancient Town, we were giggling like twits at all the lovely, creative and DIFFERENT things there were to choose from. There were still the same lacquer ware shops and bamboo bowl shops and shops selling the exact same clothing, but in the mix was a little bit of different and oh how we love a bit of different.
Hoi An is full of artists from all over the world. It is a photographer's paradise and a painter's dream. It is very difficult to not be inspired by the beautiful surroundings here.
There are also not as many people in Hoi An, meaning not as many motorbikes, which means not as noisy and much more room on the footpaths! There are also rules about what time motorbikes can be ridden through the central part of the old town, making it quite pleasant to wander around.
We stopped at a place called Mango Mango for our first Hoi An luncheon and it did not disappoint.
We ordered a variety of entree sized dishes for a bit of a tapas experience and me Jenny and I ordered this plate of absolute divineness. It was tasty, it was fresh and it had all the required elements of sweet, spicy, soft and crunchy. It was a party for one, right there in the bowl.
I would give it, hands down, the title of the best meal I've had in Vietnam - ever!
As we've come down the coast, the dining experiences are changing. In Hanoi the typical thing to do is to sit on the little plastic stools on the street to eat. In Nha Trang, they cater more for tourists, especially Russians who I'm guessing prefer to sit up at modern, adult sized tables and chairs and in Hoi An, we're still up on the tables and chairs, but we're doing it in a quaint and gorgeous style, making it modern, but without losing any of the traditional charm.
This post is really becoming a comparison between Hanoi, Nha Trang and Hoi An. It wasn't meant to be, but the differences really jump right off the page.
Take the alleyways for instance..... in Hanoi, the laneways were covered over and very dark and we guessed that they lead to where the locals live. But here in Hoi An, they are a passage to somewhere. They're an adventure. They look like places you would want to explore. They're quaint and they're crooked and I want to walk down each and every one of them.
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