Before we left Hue we decided to rent a motorbike and drive to Hoi An ourselves instead of getting another bus. This route is known as the Ha Van Pass and it was such a great experience! The journey was a total of 4 hours but it took us 8 as we made lots of stops and maybe got a little lost.. We saw beautiful views on the way and it was very different to the Ha Giang Loop as we were driving on the coast the whole time which was really pretty. We passed through Da Nang (a city on the coast) on the way which was nice to see and also had some lunch there. The weather was good up until about 2 hours from Hoi An where it started to rain really heavily. Luckily we were able to buy some ponchos from a shop but by the time we had arrived in Hoi An we were still absolutely soaked.
We had booked a total of 5 nights in Hoi An, 2 of these nights were in Tribee Khn Hostel which I would highly recommend to anyone who wants a party and a good social atmosphere! The other 3 nights we booked at a beach villa (Life Beach Villa) which was on the beach. The villa was absolutely amazing, had a beautiful pool and was a 2 minute walk to the beach. It was perfect for relaxing and winding down after lots of busy weeks travelling in Vietnam. We even decided to book an extra night as we were loving it so much!
For Hoi An itself I have to be honest we did not do as more exploring as had in the other cities of Vietnam. We spent a lot of our time relaxing by the pool or at the beach. Hoi An was a lovely place to rent bicycles so I did this twice during my stay, once to the rice fields and the other to the beach. During the evenings each night we headed into the ancient town. The ancient town was full of lots of little, cute streets with restaurants, markets and suit tailoring shop. George actually got a suit tailored which was an interesting experience and I got a dress made too. The ancient town was a beautiful place and even though it was full of lots of tourists it didn’t give me the same touristy vibe as other places on our travels so far. The entire town in the evening was lit up entirely by lanterns which made it even more special.
Hoi An was such an amazing place to visit, it was so different to any other part of Vietnam we had visited so far. An Bang beach (the main beach in Hoi An) is not one of the nicest beaches I have been to, however the Hidden Beach is beautiful and a lot less touristy so I would definitely recommend this.
So this was a very short blog (even though it was one of our favourite places so far) and I am currently writing this whilst on a 16 hour sleeper bus … oh the joy of travelling! If we could we would have definitely stayed longer in Hoi An as we loved it so much. Next stop Da Lat!! (Where we are looking forward to the cold weather!)
Adventure Awaits... 