Ah, the last stop in Vietnam! We had planned three days in Danang/ Hoi An to round off our trip, and though we didn’t really spend any time in Danang in the end, Hoi An was really, really lovely.

When we departed our Halong Bay tour on Wednesday, our guide Tiger set us up with a taxi straight to the Cat Bi airport. He had a panic when he first thought we were flying out of the Hanoi airport, which was too far away to make our flight time. Hooray for advanced planning!

At the Danang airport, as we searched our ride apps for a driver, a random gentleman approached us and told us he would drive us for the same price. Strange.

He was quite a friendly gentleman, and he wanted to give us all kinds of recommendations. It was about a forty-minute drive to our stay in Hoi An, and he made sure to call our reception to tell them we were arriving. The only catch was that he wanted to drive us back to the airport at the end of our stay and insisted on swapping phone numbers. I would later come to regret this exchange, but Sean was a fan.

After the relentless scootering and honking of Hanoi Old Town, the silent streets in the outskirts of Hoi An were soooo refreshing. Our hotel was a sort of bungalow villa, and the check-in staff were so sweet.

It didn’t take us long to conk out for the night.

Something about the bungalow vibe, the heat, the mosquitos, and the quiet surroundings had us moving sloooow in the morning. We barely made it out of our room to get breakfast at ten, but I’m sure glad we did! The spread was so yummy!

Sean wasn’t as into the breakfast me, but I was pretty much in full bliss-mode. Passion fruit, congee, shumai, sweet potato, and some local dishes. YUM.

The Vietnamese coffee here was so rich it was almost like a syrup. It tasted divine, but we both had our fair share of bathroom trips afterward…. Bahahaha.

I didn’t mind the lazy pace. Just look at this place! There was a swinging bed on our back porch facing the pond!

I also made a point of booking a room with an outdoor bathtub because it looked heavenly, but the mosquitos were so bad that I never dared to test it out. Sad.

After a very lazy morning, we played some pool by the pool (I think I won?), and then we finally dragged ourselves out onto our hotel’s free bicycles. Sean had heard about some rice paddies in town, so we went on a little adventure.

It was so pretty! We’d heard the rice plants turn a beautiful golden yellow when they are ready for harvesting, and it was so fun to see it in person.

We pedaled along as the rice swayed in the wind. Different fields were at different stages – some this golden color ready for harvest, others bright green with new life, and some were being burned to make way for the next round of planting.

It was a little precarious navigating the small paths sometimes, and we were almost bowled over by a little truck one time, but the truck driver and its passengers seemed unconcerned and unphased! We have very different car-to-bike comfort distances, haha.

We stopped in at Tra Que Village for lunch. I was skeptical of Sean’s choice in lunch spot because it had a funny name (Baby Mustard), but boy was I glad he was in charge today! We almost left because we couldn’t find anybody around at first, but just as we were heading back to our bikes, a man wandered out and assured us lunch was on.

We felt compelled to order the “Secret Drink” off the menu, and I was honestly sad we didn’t just order three of these – passionfruit deliciousness! We also got watermelon juice, Banh Xeo (a local dish), and stir fry. It was all sooooo yummy. The Banh Xeo was one of the tastiest dishes we had on our whole trip, despite its simple appearance!

Positively delighted and stuffed, we mounted our bikes and headed to the beach. We passed tarps and tarps full of drying rice in the streets. Quite a funny sight.

The beach was nice and breezy.

At the end of our beach walk, I asked a man at a beachside cafe if I could use their toilet.

“Yes, yes, free toilet. Free chair. Free water!” said the smiley man.

“Free drinks?” Sean asked with a smile.

“Aaaaaaahh!!” The man laughed, pointing at Sean. (That was a no, lol.)

When I came back from the restroom, though, I laughed as I found Sean lying in a chair with his feet propped up and a beer in his hand.

On our ride home, we stopped for a taiyaki snack (a fish-shaped waffle filled with chocolate!), and some bubble tea.

This was just an appetizer, really. After a (somewhat scary) ride home in the dark, we fought off some ants that had found some dirty clothes in our room (oops), and then headed to our hotel’s restaurant for dinner.

I ordered Cao Lau, a local noodle dish, and Sean ordered a curry dish. Both were so yummy, but the Cao Lau took the cake on this one! We paired our dinner with some delicious and super cheap cocktails. Gotta love cheap cocktails.

In the morning, we had another yummy breakfast and took it easy on the Vietnamese coffee.

A shuttle bus took us into town, and we were immediately scooped up by a lady who wanted us to shop with her. Hoi An is famous for its many tailors and clothing makers, and we were whisked away into a cavernous warehouse of fabrics and samples. I looked at a design book and thought about getting a dress, but in the end, I decided it was too much pressure to buy something before being able to see it and try it on. The fabrics were very pretty, though.

I was in heaven in the fruit market. So many colors! So many fruits! Long, skinny watermelons! So many things I hadn’t tried before! I picked up a nice sampling to snack on as we walked. I was especially excited about the lychee, rambutan, and longans. Lychee is one of my favorite fruits, but I’m allergic, so I had to eat these very slowly!

Hoi An Old Town was a delightful walk, despite the heat. It was also super dangerous for shopping. (Not safety dangerous – just dangerous in that we were blowing through all our cash, tehehe.)

The heat was killer, too. We paused for some tea, and Sean expertly modeled one of my new scarves.

Our late lunch was a smattering of brunch items – I got a smoothie bowl and Sean got some avocado toast. I got some of the café’s homemade Greek yogurt on the side, and Sean tried a blended peanut butter coffee with was to die for.

I think after that, we went back to the hotel for a nap, but we wanted to venture out again to explore Hoi An Old Town by night.

We started by visiting a famous banh mi shop. The little shop was busy, but the line moved quickly, and we were ushered to a table. The sandwiches were so yummy! I can’t with the food here. All just so cheap and so delicious.

Hoi An by night was even more bustling than it was during the day, probably because people were more willing to be outside once the heat had dwindled.

The night market stalls, paper lanterns, and lights over the river were all so mesmerizing.

At one point, we stumbled across a joyous musical event that ended up being a sort of bingo game! The two narrators were singing constantly the whole time while people held up paddles when symbols matched their card, and ladies walked around handing out little flags. I believe three flags was a winner. It was quite a spectacle. We snacked on a frozen treat while we watched.

Sean had several awkward encounters were market salesman. One of them continuously dropped the price of a pair of earrings Sean had decided he didn’t want to buy, and then he looked so sad as we walked away. Another man had these cool flying gadgets that Sean was legitimately considering buying, but we wanted to walk around first and not carry it the whole evening. We tried to explain this to him, but as we walked away, he shouted, “You lie! LIAR!”

It was crazy. I mean, it was pretty funny, but poor Sean, haha. We were kind of scared to go back at that point, so I guess he called out a self-fulfilling prophecy.

We capped off our night with a romantic little boat ride on the water as the whole town wound down.

Such a fun couple of days! I’ll finish off the trip in the next blog.

Trân trọng/ best regards,

Lizzy-wa