Hoi An

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Hoi An

After a fabulous peaceful sleep we went sightseeing. We bought tickets for the old town by yet another grumpy young women and went to the first assembly hall to discover it was closed. Back to the kiosk. After some questioning we found out the various opening times; nice of them to this on the tickets! We walked the pretty, narrow streets admiring the small, old, mustard painted buildings and poked our heads into quaint old temples, merchant houses and assembly halls. All established by refugee Chinese. We sampled some delicious local cuisine; duck wonton, 'white rose' and cau lau in a tiny restaurant. We then watched a traditional music and dance performance which featured a good singer too, the first we've heard in Vietnam.

If we weren't on bicycles I would have made a few purchases. There were clothes galore, colourful silk lanterns, amazing wooden sculptures and photo galleries, an art fan's heaven. We particularly liked a beautiful tapestry of an old ladie's face. For tea we couldn't resist another trip to Dingo's. Our hotel provided the comfort we had keenly sought, but strangely the receptionist was desperate to push postcards and train tickets on us!

Hoi An to Danang to Dong Hoi

An easy ride on a good road but with very little of interest. Ladies guarded the road to the sea front, demanding money for parking. So we only enjoyed the sea-views once we arrived at Danang. The five marble mountains on route proved to be rather mundane hillocks and the remainder of the road was lined on the one side with huge 5 Star resorts or resorts under development. On the other, city planners had built roads and were waiting hopefully for developers. There is rather an odd situation of one or two houses per street with mainly empty plots.

Once we reached Danang istelf, the promenade and beach looked amazing, and the waves were good for surfing or bodyboarding. But we weren't tempted due to the cloudy and rather chilly weather. The city of Danang was busy and not very attractive, we booked our train tickets and waited for 5 o'clock at a cafe across the road. It housed an unusual collection of bicycles; including a Porsche-branded motorised bicycle!

On the train we had an hour of daylight which revealed a beautiful view around the coastline. The vibrant green hills were eerily shrouded in mist. We rattled along in the dark for another five hours to Dong Hoi.

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