Historic and Beautiful Hoi An

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We left Saigon on a 7pm train and settled into our 4 berth sleeper. It turned out that our compartment mates were two young women with two small kids – one probably two years old and the other around seven. It looked like we will not be bored during our train travel. We weren’t wrong, the older boy was very friendly and came down from his top bunk probably at least 10-15 times to talk to us (all in Vietnamese), look at our card game or scrabble game on the iPad. It was quite a fun experience up until 5am when both kids woke up and resumed their loud routines.

We arrived in Danang about 30 minutes late and made quick friends with an Australian couple, with whom we ended up sharing our taxi to Hoi An.

Hoi An is small city in Vietnam, on the coast of the South China Sea in the South Central Coast of Vietnam. It is located in Quang Nam province and is home to approximately 120,000 inhabitants. It is recognized as a World Heritage Site by UNESCO.

The city possessed the largest harbour in Southeast Asia in the 1st century and was known as Lam Ap Pho (Champa City). Between the seventh and 10th centuries, the Cham (people of Champa) controlled the strategic spice trade and with this came tremendous wealth. The former harbor town of the Cham at the estuary of the Thu Bon River was an important Vietnamese trading centre in the 16th and 17th centuries, where Chinese from various provinces as well as Japanese, Dutch and Indians settled. During this period of the China trade, the town was called Hai Pho (Seaside Town) in Vietnamese. Originally, Hai Pho was a divided town with the Japanese settlement across the "Japanese Bridge" (16th-17th century). The bridge is a unique covered structure built by the Japanese, the only known covered bridge with a Buddhist pagoda attached to one side.

We were immediately charmed by the colorful old quarter, the bridges over the river, boats and Chinese lanterns everywhere.

We checked into Long Life Riverside hotel, which was right in the heart of the Old Quarter, the location was perfect. We took bicycles provided by the hotel and cruised for lunch (we were quite hungry) and tailors. Hoi An is quite renowned for having a long history of custom tailors. After we had been fortified, we stopped by the recommended Kimmey tailor to see what they had. Four hours later we walked out of Kimmey a bit dazed. They had taken every possible measurement; we had selected 36 items of clothing between the two of us, and had selected all of the fabrics, colors, linings etc. We set up 3 more appointments for additional fittings over the course of our time in Hoi An. Later that evening we went to a great local restaurant that Lacey wrote up well in her food travel blog, it did not disappoint! At the end of our dinner, they miscalculated our bill in our favor by about $20USD (nearly a 50% discount). We pointed it out to them and they were shocked we just didn’t go and pocket the difference; I guess not all tourists are as sincere!

Afterwards we went to the Then & Now pub for foosball. It was very popular place. We had to wait our turn for the foosball table and then win the game to stay on the table. We met a friendly group that were traveling together, from Poland and Romania, and joined them for good conversation at the Aussie Bar, fortunately located only steps from our hotel.

The following day, we joined Heaven and Earth biking tour to explore the outskirts of town. It was more of a cultural tour with the convenience of bicycles, rather than a biking tour. Our guide Lan was fantastic. We enjoyed beautiful boat rides, biking over bamboo bridges, and learning about traditional Vietnamese houses (they have 3 front doors: one for men, one for women, and one door reserved only for special guests when they have important business to discuss). We learned about the Solar and Lunar calendars, and the Vietnamese’s strong reverence for their family elders (children may not know their own birthdays, but they know the day and date that their grandfather passed away). We also saw the local women make traditional sleeping mats and later men making large baskets that are used for fishing in the local river. They constructed baskets instead of boats because in the beginning of the 19^th century the French put a tax on boats and obviously baskets are not boats! We were able to try and use the baskets – it was a challenge and certainly the highlight of the tour. We also learned about local rice production as well as visited a local shop where ornate furniture with pearl inlays were being made. Kostek made friends with local kids along the way and the tour was the highlight of our stay in Hoi An.

The following day we joined the oldest cooking class in Hoi An, Morning Glory. We were both really impressed with the fresh take on traditional Central Vietnamese cooking. The food we made was restaurant quality; we were surprised that we were able to cook such tasty Vietnamese food right off the bat. (I think this was because of the delicious fresh ingredients and great instructor). The best dish was certainly the cabbage soup with shrimp, which were stuffed into small cabbage rolls – a bit like Asian golabki! At the end we got the expanded cookbook, signed by the chef and owner, Ms. Vy. We look forward to trying our hand at it when we return to New York. After a tasty morning, we headed over for our second fitting at Kimmey. We tried on our clothes and they refined their measurements and every item we purchased. We then headed over to the beach to enjoy the late afternoon sun and sunset. I was impressed how pristine and quiet the beach was, what a great day.

The next morning we woke up early to join the Australian couple Neville and his wife on their street food tour, The Last Taste of Hoi An. They started the tour about 9 months ago and we enjoyed Neville’s enthusiasm, context he provided behind the food, and variety of safe and tasty street food. We tried a tiny taste of all 40 items on his tour throughout the town. The tour also included a walk through the market where we learned about various local fresh herbs and ingredients. In Vietnam there are 7 tastes – sweet, salty, sour, crunchy, soft, silky, and spicy. The more of these tastes and textures in a single dish the better. Our favorite food from the tour was a fruit shake that has been made by the same family for five generations alongside one of the streets of Hoi An – it had probably between 6-8 different types of fruit, including dragon fruit, mango and banana.

Then of course we went to Kimmey for our 3^rd fitting. We were pleasantly surprised to see how much better the clothes fit at the 3^rd fitting; just a few minor tweaks on a couple of items were all that needed another alteration. We were also impressed that our fitters both came in on their day off to make sure our clothes were progressing as planned. Kimmy’s agreed to include other souvenirs that we bought in the package of clothes they were sending back to the US for us and our total weight came to…39kg! We have certainly contributed our share to Vietnam’s balance of payments.

The following day we both agreed that time in this quaint and charming town was drawing too quickly to a close. I was not looking forward to the upcoming 17 hr overnight train to Hanoi. Luckily, Kostek went to a local travel agency who had great prices for last minute flights to Hanoi. They cancelled our train tickets and booked us on a flight a day later. With the extra time we found ourselves at a shop that turned around custom shoes and leather purses for us in 24 hours. We slept comfortably one more night in Hoi An and arrived in Hanoi an hour earlier than had we taken the train, well worth the small increase in cost for a good night’s rest.

All aboard, I mean tray tables and seat backs up: next stop – Hanoi!

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Comments

[Mom]

Great place
It looks like you are really enjoying everything! Great pix.