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Published: July 27th 2006
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Needless to say that the bus from Nha Trang turned up late as usual. The journey was uncomfortable and sleepless, but the saving grace was when we stopped for a break and watched the sunrise which was beautiful.
We arrived in Hoi An at around 6am, knew of a hotel that El and Doireann were staying at so checked in and due to our time wasting in Nha Trang, had to immediately book the bus out at 8am the next morning. We decided to go for a swim at the sister hotel to the one we were staying in. We spent a very relaxing morning in the pool and were sneered at by all of the French holiday makers. I think this may have had something to do with the fact that we hadn’t washed for a couple of days and by running and bombing into the water we had inadvertently ignored the only two rules at the pool: Shower before you swim & No jumping (whoopssee!).
As the day progressed it just got hotter and hotter. Nha Trang was warm, but here in Hoi An it is off the scale! By midday it must have got to between
35 and 40 degrees!
Once we were done, we decided to spend the afternoon doing a walking tour of the town. It was a really pleasant walk, Hoi An is a lovely little town with a huge amount of character. Due to it being smaller than a lot of the other places we have been so far, there were a lot less motorbikes and traffic, people mainly travel around by push bike, making for a quiet and relaxing time. We stopped off at various cultural museums and pagodas which were interesting, but by far the most enjoyable aspect was taking in the peaceful atmosphere and admiring the architecture.
Hoi An seems to be renowned for tailors. On every street there are scores of suit shops. The guys here will pretty much make you anything. You can take in a picture of your favourite designer shoes and have them made for about $20US, which isn’t bad considering they look exactly the same and they are hand-made to measure.
After cutting the walk short due to the relentless heat, and the early signs of sunburn, we decided to find the beach and have a swim. The beach is located
around 4km outside the town so we hired push bikes and made our way down there. The bikes were rickety to say the least, seriously in need of a service, with brakes that were non-existent, but that all added to the fun! An entertaining if somewhat dangerous journey ensued, laughing at Deano who after putting his t-shirt half way over his head looked like a cross between Eric Idle in ‘Nuns on the Run’ and a slightly deranged Arab.
The beach was really nice. It was quite underdeveloped leaving the landscape reasonably unspoilt. The sea was quite choppy, but lovely and warm compared to Nha Trang. Jumped in for a dip and was having great fun body surfing on the waves, when I stood on something hard. I felt down under the water and pulled out what looked like a human bone!!!! I was a little freaked out by it so didn’t spend too much more time swimming for fear of what I might find next!
Made our way back to the Hotel and decided to grab a bite to eat. We had been recommended a place called the Bamboo Bar, owned by an Australian lady. Ordered English
Sausages and mashed potatoes. It was Excellent by Vietnamese standards, but not quite up to the quality of Kerridge’s (oh how I miss them!).
Due to all of the bars closing at 11pm here, we decided to have another couple of drinks back at the room. By this time there were quite a few of us so the guy on the street stall must have thought all of his Christmas’ had come at once when Deano and I ordered 3 bottles of Vodka and 4 bottles of coke. He even gave us a free lighter as a ‘souvenir’ of Vietnam. This was all very well until I went to light a cigarette and nearly burnt my face of with the mini flamethrower that was in my hand. I bet he was chuckling away to himself for hours about that! Inevitably we all ended up very drunk after numerous drinking games - maybe not the best of ideas considering we had to be awake at 7.30 for the bus!
I must say that the little time I spent in Hoi An was thoroughly enjoyable. It really is the kind of place where you need to spend a few days
to explore and soak up the atmosphere. I was really quite pissed off to leave considering the only reason for our brief stay was drinking too much in Nha Trang (damn Vodka!!). Anyone planning to travel up the coast, learn from my mistake and leave a few days aside for Hoi An.
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Elly
non-member comment
Hot???
Oh my god. You're such a wimp. It's been that hot here in Britain. It's been between 25-35 for the last few weeks. It was 31 yesterday! Grow some balls!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Sat outside AOH having a drink in the sunshine with Gareth and Lucy earlier. It was just like old times... Miss ya, xxxxxxx