The charm continues

After spending so much time in crazy cities, Hoi An is the perfect place to slow down, pick and choose what feel like doing even if it’s just strolling through the town or lounging at our homestay. I’ll admit that I wish I could have an entire new wardrobe and new shoes made here as the area is well known for its abundance of good quality tailors. Very few regular clothing stores here and it definitely contributes to the town’s character.

We spent one morning exploring Marble Mountain, which is a 40-minute drive into the neighbouring town of Da Nang. We tackled one of five and each have caves, tunnels and several Buddhist sanctuaries within the mountains making it a popular tourist destination. The area is well known for sculpture and craft making and the roads are lined with shops incase you feel the need for a 10 foot marble Buddha in your house. As usual, without the help of a map or signs we wandered around until we found pathways and caves to explore. Pretty sure we missed a couple things since we somehow ended up at the bottom of the mountain at a different entrance than the one we came up.

That evening the owner of our lovely homestay, Mr. Phuc, took us on a bike tour of the area. We cruised through rice fields, dodged under tents in the market, said hello to some students at the local school and stopped at his friends cooking school for a rest. It was nice to have a guide and our stay at his historical house has been lovely, including the language barrier with the staff that usually ends in us both laughing when we don’t understand.

The previous days bike ride was good practice for our trip to the beach. The traffic is not nearly as crazy as in HCM or Hanoi but you still have to pay 100% attention since most people fail to look before turning onto the street or whizz by unnervingly close with only their horn to warn you at the last second. Unfortunately the waves were too big to enjoy much of a swim but we enjoyed parking ourselves under an umbrella for a good part of the day instead. People watching and chatting with the local bracelet sellers about how “funny happy” we are made for a good afternoon.

Our homestay from across the river. 

One of my new favourite ladies! 

There was no reason to believe this was a tunnel I should be crawling into, but I gave it a try and it turned into another cave! 

One of multiple statues carved into the existing rock. 

A view well worth the 600 steps (and on vivid colour mode).

Another spectacular cave which is much larger than the picture shows. 

Bike tour lesson #1. How to avoid scooters, other bikes, cars and cows. 

Baby water buffalo keeping cool. 

Mom leading the way. 

Cua Dai Beach. Nothing fancy but no complaints here. 

Traditional bamboo bucket fishing boats. I can't imagine these being good in anything but perfect weather but they make it work. 

Hội An

I don’t think I’ve used the word charming so many times in 3 days. Hoi An is a historic town on the South Central Coast of Vietnam with a population of 120,000, much smaller than that we’ve been experiencing so far. With its ancient architecture, easy going demeanour, ancient town along the river and abundance of tailoring shops and food vendors, I could get comfortable here. If you get tired of the town experience, you can easily rent bicycles or motorbikes, take the 10-20 minute journey to the beach and lounge under an umbrella for the entire day.  

In addition to the copious amount of walking we’ve been doing through the town (yet another UNCESO World Heritage Site), we’ve had fun buying multiple mystery street desserts (they were all delicious), chatted up the friendly locals which usually starts out with them trying to drag us into their shops, stopped into a few heritage sites (which make zero sense without a guide or English signs) and done a few day trips.

One thing I had on my to-do list while in Hoi An was a cooking class. There are a million options for classes here but based on a friends recommendation, we singed up for one that involved taking a boat to the school and learned to cook multiple Vietnamese dishes. Everything we made was fantastic which included rice pancakes, spring rolls, eggplant in a clay pot, vegetable decorations and homemade rice paper (I was overly excited about that one). I have said it before and will say it again, Vietnamese food is delicious and I want it all! 

So. much. charm. 

Fruit for sale. 

Of of the heritage sites (an assembly hall of some type). 

Can never get enough of the food markets.

Our boat ride out to the cooking school. My mother also discovered through a hilarious conversation in broken english that our anchor was made from a shovel. 

Concentrating hard on my rice paper. I think I need some practice.

You can buy lanterns to float down the river. Not sure what happens to them (hoping they don't just pollute the area) but they sure look pretty. 

The streets are lit up with hanging lanterns, new food and souvenir vendors come out in the cool of the evening and the restaurants are buzzing with tourists. This area is also a walking/biking zone only which makes it extra lovely to stroll down. 

We didn't really know what this was when we bought it but it looked like a powdered doughnut. Turns out it is made from rice (a soft rice glob of sorts) with sweet red beans in the middle. I plan to eat more. 

We stopped at one of the "restaurants" along the river. Once we started eating the woman came over saying "no, no, no" and had to show us how to eat everything properly. Ha! I'm sure they are used to it though. 

Cruising Hạ Long Bay

Ha Long Bay is a bay of monolithic islands rising up from the Gulf of Tonkin. Halong translates to 'where the dragon descends into the sea' and legend claims the islands were created by a great dragon from the mountains. There are around 2,000 islands, some hallowed out by huge caves, and is a UNESCO World Heritage Site plus one of the 7 Wonders of Nature. We travelled 100km during our 3 day/2 night trip on the "Au Co" covering Halong, Lan Ha and Bai Tu Long Bays. There are currently 400 boat tour operators on the water and the government is currently reviewing how to maintain the stunning beauty of the area and minimize environmental impact.

All the meals were delicious (all 5 courses) and a shout out to the the kitchen is needed because they were an absolute dream accommodating everyone's dietary restrictions. The evenings were spent lounging at the bar, participating in food carving or squid fishing off the deck. A big highlight was touring Sung Sot Cave which is one of the largest grottos in the bay. Local fishermen used to live in the caves until the government opened it up to tourists 20 years ago and they chose to live in floating villages instead. Not only were the caves beautifully intricate but we were also blown away but the sheer size. We were snapping photos like crazy while our guide was hilariously trying to point out all sorts of animals in the rocks.

During the second day we took traditional bamboo rowboats through the Vung Vieng Floating village. About 1,600 people used to live in the village until the government started encouraging people to move to the mainland for work, health and safety reasons about 5 months ago. The numbers are now down to 300 and the site appears to be mainly for tourists to check out some of the few houses left, the old school and have the opportunity to buy pearls from the area and other souvenirs.  

Another great excursion was kayaking around the islands and through some naturally formed caves. After an hour of paddling the crew met us on one of the larger motorized boats and we spent the rest of the afternoon floating around in the Viet Hai Lagoon. The day ended with a delicious barbecue stocked with fresh seafood and traditional Vietnamese dessert.

This scene never got old. 

Best view from the terrace. 

These women are selling everything from beer to oreos and will use a fishing net to pass things up to the second floor. It's a hard way of life on the water and I wanted to buy everything from everyone.

Spring roll food demonstration, complete with speed rolling competition and learning how to yell cheers in Vietnamese. 

Sung Sot Cave, aka Surprise Cave.

My pictures hardly do the size and detail justice.

View from the top of the caves.

Our bamboo boats used to tour the village. It was incredibly peaceful and the locals seemed to be keeping themselves entertained by racing and chatting (probably about us!). 

One of the few floating houses. Some people live in small homes while others are only on boats. 

Kayaking through caves. 

The water was a little chilly but still warmer than home! 

On our last morning we hiked up a hill and finished off swimming at the beach. We kept feeling little pin pricks and later found out that it was stinging plankton. Who knew since you couldn't actually see them!

250 steps to the top!

Hanoi

This is where I fell in love in Vietnam. With it's clean beautiful parks, walkable sidewalks, charming food stalls and markets, stunning architecture and lovely people. After a rough start in HCM I am relieved that our experience did a 180 as soon as we stepped foot in Hanoi. After walking around Hoan Kiem Lake, a historical lake in the heart of of the city, we strolled through the Old Quarter and stumbled upon a huge night market. The narrow streets are packed with people enjoying all kinds of delicious looking food and the whole place has a great buzzing atomosphere that makes you want to come back for more. I was disappointed that our visit here was so brief but it is definitely a place I would come back to if given the chance (and not forget my camera so I can take a million pictures!).

The temple on the lake hidden by trees. 

A typical street in the old quarter. 

Fresh cane juice is a newly found favourite of mine and will miss it dearly. 

The lake at night. There were a ton of people out enjoying the huge pedestrian only area surrounding the park. You could run around it, play a game, grab a coffee or snack and sit or simply stroll around and people watch. 

A familiar scene of a woman working in the rice field on our way out of the city. 

Ho Chi Min City

An early wake up was well worth the visit to the Cu Chi Tunnels. These are an immense network of underground tunnels with several floors and branches adding up to more than 250 km long. The tunnels were the location of several military campaigns during the Vietnam War. They were used by the Viet Cong Soldiers as hiding spots during combat as well as food and living quarters for numerous North Vietnamese fighters.

We could go through one section of tunnels that was likely at least twice the size as many of the pathways. The deeper they went (some parts have 3 levels), the narrower they got. They would also be in complete darkness and those who dug them knew how to get around by memory. We look happy but both of us felt pretty claustrophobic. 

The tunnels were intentionally made extremely narrow for 2 reasons. First so that they were less likely to collapse and to prevent American soldiers fitting into them.

Example of one of many booby traps.

People would sleep, cook, bath and go to school in the bunkers. The kitchen would have long vents that released the smoke further away so that it wouldn't give away their position. During periods of heavy bombing they would be forced to stay underground for days with little air, food or water. 

An example of a hidden entrance to the tunnels.

We finished off another heavy the day in the backpacker area on my quest for some much anticipated Pho. We then walked through the Ben Thanh Night Market which is another bargaining spot for everything from clothes to souvenirs. There are also a ton of street food vendors which look pretty safe and delicious which means I have lots of eating to do in the next 2 weeks. 

Happy camper. 

Night Market. 

Good Morning Vietnam!

My mom and I made a last minute decision to head to Vietnam for a couple weeks. And by we I think I actually mean me. So 7 hours later, we were in middle of utter chaos of Ho Chi Min City (formally Saigon) getting ripped off by a taxi driver. After arriving at our hotel we took the opportunity to explore our street and start mapping out a plan for the next 14 days.

Day 1 we walked to some nearby attractions to get our bearings which also gave us the chance to adjust to walking through traffic which is a big step up compared to Phnom Penh. The roads are absolutely mental and I can't say it's a good thing if you plan on keeping your limbs while walking on the sidewalk. There are some similar sights and sounds like the street food, shops and local workers but overall it feels much different to Cambodia.

So at the risk of sounding prematurely judgy, I am going to say that my initial reactions are that people (and drivers) are way more aggressive and scams (and bogus tourist companies) are so common that it has me feeling uneasy and has made some of the planning stressful. Despite being off to a shaky start, we are remaining positive!

Shoe repair. 

The sidewalk being used as a road. In this picture you couldn't even sway to the left without the risk of being smoked. 

Portable food vendor. 

Playing cards in the park. A shoe shiner actually sat down beside us and watched us play for 30 minutes despite not speaking a word of english. 

A worker sitting on top of a mess of wires while his coworkers untangled another pile of them on the ground. 

The War Remnants Museum was heavy as we read about the history and viewed a huge collection of photos taken during the war and after. The photos of people affected by poisonous gas (agent orange) and subsequent birth defects was particularly hard to see. While the displays are incredibly one-sided (lots of American blame) it was still enlightening.

The Independence Palace was a government building and home/office of the President of South Vietnam during the Vietnam War. A 1962 bombing (an assassination attempt) resulted in a the newer building we see today. It is now mainly a tourist attraction where you can view the elaborate meeting rooms and underground bomb shelter.  

Cheers to surviving the first 2 days in the craziest city I've ever been to.