The Big Con

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After the awful train journey (no air-con and chain smoking locals) to Nha Trang we decided to fly to the next place which was Danang in order to get to Hoi An. This was much better however it was the first time I have ever been on a plane that had graffiti.

We caused a big argument amongst the taxi drivers at the airport as there is the usual 'rip off the tourist' set fee to Hoi An. However during discussion with the girls who were asking for this, the Taxi drivers behind signalled a cheaper price to us which we took, much to the annoyance of the girls. We don't know any swear words in Vietnamese but we were pretty sure we were hearing them on the radio as we left.
Hoi An was really lovely with loads of touristy shops with great wood carvings and tailors. I had a lovely 30min shampoo and head massage for about 80p (bargain!). It was done by Madame Lee based in the Market area.
The only let down was the Hotel we stayed in, it was recommended in the Lonely planet guide and although it was based in the old town (very central) it had no windows to the outside (hence we accidentally slept till noon!). The water was yellow and had dead fly things in it and I was terrorised by a cockroach on the last day. Anyone planning to go to Hoi An should stay just outside the old town.

We travelled on to a place called Hue on the coach. When your travelling you find that you keep bumping into people you've already met. At the coach rest stop we met up with some girls we had travelled from Phnom Penh with and bumped into again in Nha Trang. In Hue we also bumped into this Dutch girl we had done the Elephant trekking tour with in Chiang Mai. It really is a small small world.

After the horrid Hoi An hotel we made sure we got a really nice one in Hue, we also booked a boat tour from here as well (what a mistake!)

The boat tour itself is really cheap (pound each) and you are meant to visit the tombs/temples/pagodas along the river. It rained the whole day and what the hotel did not tell us is that some of these places are a few kilometres from the river, and the boat operators have a commission thing going on with moped drivers that can take you there. After seeing a few accidents we have vowed never to get on the back of any of these things especially going through muddy dirt tracks in the rain, hence we missed out on most of the sights. Thankfully we were not the only ones, we met a couple of fellow English lads who were waiting for their group to return as well and they were also feeling a bit naffed off. What was really bad about this boat was that one of the American tourists in our group later found someone had gone through his bag, tampered with his phone and stole 100, 000 dong (~4pounds) from his wallet whilst he was at a temple.

We managed to visit the citadel in Hue which was worth the dong and was generally hassle free. This was the palact type place where the former Vietnamese emporers resided. However a lot of it was destroyed in the French and American wars.

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Photos

Pagoda in Hue
This is one of the pagodas we saw on that boat trip.

Feeding time
These were the carp at the citadel that you could feed.

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Just one of the amazing things you can transport on your cyclo.
We've also seen dead pigs on the back of mopeds as well as stacks of hay!