My Son and Nha Trang

We've had a couple of early mornings and long days.  We got up before the sun to go to My Son just outside of Hoi An, got on an overnight bus to Nha Trang, sort of slept on the bus, arrived in Nha trang around 7am and explored the city.  It has definitely felt like more than two days have passed with all the stuff we did!

Oct 26 – My Son and bus

We were up before the sun to go on our My Son tour, pronounced Me Son. Part of the attempt to draw in tourists for this early morning tour was to see the sun rise at My Son. We didn't get there in time for the sun rise but fortunately breakfast wasn't too bad, eggs and a baguette. We arrived at My Son after the sun had risen but it was nice and quiet with just our group of 20 there. Our guide actually guided us around to the different sites explaining some things as she went. My Son was a Hindu place of worship, it was abandoned by it's Cham builders several hundred years ago. The Vietnamese people pushed the Cham's out of the area. My Son suffered much destruction during the American/Vietnam war. You can see bomb craters in the earth. It's very sad that some of history was destroyed during modern war. There has been some reconstruction of My Son, some before the war. Archeologists still do not know the recipe to remake the bricks or how the bricks were stuck together as no mortar was used. The difference between the bricks is striking. The new bricks are blacked with moss and are much rougher on the surface, while the old bricks have little moss growing on them and are still smooth. It's very cool to see ancient engineering besting modern engineering. We didn't spend too long at My Son but it was enough to see everything. We got back on the bus just in time, it started raining. The rain had stopped by the time we got back to the hotel. We had a little nap, checked out, and got some breakfast. We headed down to the Central Market, something we should have done sooner and checked out pearls, fruit, and food. I picked up my dress, it now fit properly and had the embroidery finished. We escaped the heat by getting some 3000d draft beers and some spring rolls. We wandered Hoi An some more and beaded back to the market for some very cheap food. We bumped into Christina and Mark on the way to the bus and said our good byes. Hopefully we'll get to see them again somewhere. The bus to Nha Trang wasn't too bad. We did have to stop for a bit to change a tire though. At least the bus had A/C when it was running and the windows opened.

My Son

 

 

My Son

My Son - New brick on left, old brick on right

Hoi An River Side

Oct 27 – Nha Trang

We arrived in Nha Trang this morning and surprisingly had actually been able to get some sleep on the bus. I did get to see the sun rise over the ocean. We found a hotel with little trouble, the bus dropped us off in front of it. We weren't all that sleepy so we set off to find breakfast. This was harder than we thought it would be. There are a ton of hotels around us but not too many restaurants. We found a little place selling rice and whatever you wanted on top. I got egg and Beau got squid. It wasn't bad and it was cheap. We rented a motorcycle, again, first we went the Long Son Pagoda behind which was a huge seated Buddha. It was super hot out. Afterwards we headed to the Po Nagar Cham towers. These were built by the same people as My Son but seemed in better condition. There had been 10 towers at one point but not only 4 remain, they were built between the seventh and twelfth century. I like My Son better, it had more character, especially being set out in the jungle, these are right in the city. The Cham towers were very busy with worshipers and tourists. It was only noon so we set off to find Bai Dai Beach, a nice beach 20km south of Nha Trang. We actually found it with only a little bit of driving around. It had beautiful white sandy beaches and minimal tourists. We went for a dip to cool down and then got some lunch. We had BBQ clams, crab and noodles. Yum! We hung out on the beach for a bit and then went swimming again. There were some good waves to play in, a few people were surfing. It was fun just bobbing around. We dried off and headed back into Nha Trang. We got cleaned up and headed out for some dinner. We had seafood hot pot. It was delicious. The staff seemed to think we didn't know what we were doing so they dumped all the food into the hot pot for us. We were going to cook stuff as we ate it but apparently that isn't right. It turned out very nice though.

Big Buddha

Cham Towers

Cham Towers

Bai Dai Beach

mmm Sea Food Hot Pot

Hoi An - Great City

I think Hoi An is my favorite city so far! It so pretty at night with all the lights everywhere.  There's lots of good food and all the tailor shops have such beautiful colours.  It's really lovely.  I'm a little sad we'll be moving on tomorrow but I'm excited for the next stop, Nha Trang.  I would definitely come back to this city!

Oct 24 - Marble Mountains

Beau, the silly man that he is, woke up early to watch part of the Packers game, the third quarter started at 5am... Silly man. After going back to sleep for a bit we had breakfast at the hotel and rented a motorcycle from across the street. We decided to head towards Da Nang and go to the Marble Mountains. Typically, we missed the turn and drove for awhile in the not quite right direction. We were at least going north but on the wrong road. We did make it to the Marble Mountains after a guy stopped to help us lost looking tourists. We climbed all over the main mountain. There were all kinds of caves which are actually temples. There were Buddhas all over the mountain. We headed up one set of stairs and made it to the very top of the mountain. The view was pretty spectacular, with all different scenes depending on the way you looked. One way you could see the other mountains, another the city and another the sea. It was well worth the buckets of sweat it took to get up there. It was a hot one. We headed down from the mountains and went in search of lunch. We stopped at a road side seafood restaurant but it was much too expensive. We drove around a little and Beau followed his nose to a BBQ. We didn't know what to order as the menu didn't have anything recognizable on it. We ordered the little bird the guy was bbqing (might have been pigeon) and a chicken leg. It was delicious, seasoned really nicely. We were still hungry so Beau pointed to one of the cheaper things on the menu and order us that. We are pretty sure it was snails but again very tasty although a little spicy. It was an interesting lunch experience that turned out very good in the end. We headed back towards Hoi An and hit up the beach. While we were parking the bike the parking guy serenaded us with a song about Canada and the beach and swimming and looking after the bike. It was random and hilarious! We went for a nice swim in the ocean and then headed back to the hotel. We decided to keep the bike for tomorrow since it was only $4 a day. We got cleaned up and met up with Mark and Christina for dinner by the river. The food was quite good and we had strategically placed ourselves to watch the free local dance show that goes on every night at 7:30. It to entice people to come watch the full show. After dinner we headed to a tailors shop that had a bunch of recommendation from our hotel. Beau and I thought about having suits made up but it would be too much effort to send home. I did buy a green Asian style dress with embroidery down the front. It quite pretty, although after ordering I did see other dresses that I liked a lot too. We then had some cheap local beers at a riverside restaurant before heading to bed.

On Top of Marble Mountain

The view from the top, some of the other Marble Mountains.

Happy Buddha and temple

On the mountain.

Oct 25 - Lazy Beach Day

We woke up to another beautiful day! We set off to the beach again after having some breakfast. We arrived at a different beach from the one yesterday which had fewer tourists. We parked the bike and walked down. We were approached by several Vietnamese women who said we can use their beach loungers and should eat at their restaurant later. We said we might eat there later and thought we could use the chairs anyways... wrong. After sitting in the sun and going for a nice swim we wanted some lunch. We checked out the woman's menu but it was quite expensive compared to the other restaurants prices. We chose another and sat down only to have the woman from earlier hunt us down and demand we eat at her restaurant or else pay for the lounger. None of this was to our understanding and she was being quite rude so we decided to leave that area all together, without paying to use the lounger. We drove down the road near where we had been the day before and found a reasonably priced seafood restaurant. We ate some delicious clams and shrimp while standing under a patio umbrella because it had started to pour. The weather cleared up again so we were able to enjoy the beach for a bit. We went for a little cruise around on the bike and then headed back to the hotel to get cleaned up. I had to get my dress fitted, which was a little tight across the bust, surprising since it's not too big to start with.... We got a early morning tour booked for My Son tomorrow and our bus onwards to Nha Trang. We wandered around trying to find some deals on pearls and had to go back to the tailors for another fitting. It was still a little tight but they need to do the embroidery on it still anyways so it should be good tomorrow. We met up with Mark and Christina there and went to a restaurant that advertised cheap local food. It was quite good and had recently been opened by a younger guy that thought there should be one price for tourists and locals alike. Good Man! It had been pouring intermittently through out the evening, fortunately we were always under cover for the down pour. We went for some beer and dessert and parted ways for the evening. Beau and I have to be up early tomorrow.... Yuck

Hue and Onwards

We were a little disappointed with our guided motorcycle tour.  The guy was more of a driver than a guide.  We had hoped to have him with us at the sites so we could get more information about each place but he just gave us a little spiel and sent us on our way.  We felt like we could have done a similar tour on our own so we'll probably stick to doing it ourselves. Since it wasn't a great experience we decided against motorcycling to Hoi An especially since we already had tickets.  I guess we know to ask more questions in the future so we can fully understand what we are paying for.

Oct 22 – Bike tour around Hue

We were picked up at the hotel at 8:30 this morning. The first stop on the tour was the Temple of Princess Huyen Tran and her father King Tran Nhan Tong. To get there we drove through a massive cemetery. It was quite beautiful and interesting to see the similarities and difference to the cemeteries back home. Some grave markers were quite colourful and ornate. We arrived at the temple and were told we had about 50min. Our guide just hung out while we went in, so he really wasn't much of a guide. It was a beautiful set of temples. We could have spent a bit longer there. There was a small mountain to climb and a bell at the top that Beau rang. There was next to no one there, possibly because it was fairly early. From there we went to a war memorial where there were many soldiers buried. We didn't spend very long here because we needed to get to a Buddhist temple to see their daily prayer ceremony. Three times a day the Buddhist monks prey with chanting and music, each time for about half an hour. We arrived in time to see the last 10 minutes of the prayer and it was quite interesting. We spent a little time looking around the temple and the were on our way again. We stopped at a roadside stand that was selling souvenir crap but we were shown how they make incense, which they burn everywhere, and the conical shaped bamboo hats, here they put poems in the hat so you can see them when you hold the hat to the light, so I guess it was okay. Next we went to a hill top that had some American bunkers on it. We did a little off roading to get up to the top. There was a pretty good view of the Perfume River, which wasn't the prettiest of colours. There wasn't all that much to see of the bunkers besides some cylindrical concrete sticking a couple of feet above the ground. Next we went to the Tomb of Emperor Tu Duc. The tomb originally had 50 buildings but many of which have succumbed to the passage of time, although the tomb is only 100 years old. It was very nice in a mossy sort of way. Our guide asked us if we wanted to stop for lunch, there were a bunch of little restaurants outside of the tomb but they all sold the same thing at inflated prices. We told he we wanted local food so we hopped back on the bikes. Our next stop was an arena used to fight elephants and tigers. The elephants always won because the tigers were declawed and detoothed. The elephant represented the emperors power so obvious it had to win. We headed back into the city where we did get local food. The guide took us down an alley to a restaurant where there were a bunch of Vietnamese eating. I finally got my vermicelli bowl that I have been dying to have it's called Banh Thit Nurong we also had some delicious fresh spring rolls. Our last stop was the Thien Mu Pagoda. Another pretty site. We were a bit disappointed with our tour. We assumed that our guide would come into the sites with us and tell us about the places. Besides finding us really good food we probably would have been fine on our own. We did talk him into let us keep the bike for the rest of the day but we had to change bikes. We then went to into the citadel which is the old walled city and into the Forbidden Purple Palace, the former home of the emperor. The palace is slowly being restored so it was interesting to see the difference between how it did look and how it looks now. The grounds were beautiful as was the architecture. We cruised around Hoi An a bit then headed back to the hotel. We stopped off at the Backpackers hostel again for 2-4-1 beers and ran into a couple, Mark and Christina, who were our dorm mates in Hanoi. We had dinner with them at another restaurant our guide had suggested, also where we returned the bike. The food was quite good too. We were all on the bus to Hoi An (Beau and I decided against motorcycles since we already had the ticket and we weren't impressed with dude) so we decided to go out. We went to a bar that was handing out fliers for 2-4-1 drinks. Beau and Mark played some pool with some locals and Christina and I got to talking with a Vietnamese girl that works at the bar. We had a really fun night dancing and drinking.

Beau ringing the bell for good luck

The monks praying

The Perfume River

Emperor Tu Duc's Tomb

Thein Mu Pagoda

The Forbidden Purple Palace

Oct 23 – On to Hoi An

We were leaving for Hoi An today so we packed up our stuff and headed out for breakfast. After eating we went to the Backpackers hostel because that's where we got the bus from. We had about an hour or two to kill before the bus but I got to Skype with Elaine!! We got on our bus but it waited around for a bit before we left. It was about a 3 hour bus ride to Hoi An. Fairly scenic but I can't imagine doing it on a motorcycle now with how crazy the traffic is here! We arrived at the bus station and of course there were people saying come to my hotel. We caught a ride to a hotel which was supposedly in the city centre, it was more like the edge of the city centre. It was okay but we thought we'd keep looking. We found a reasonable and clean hotel and set off for dinner. The restaurant had reasonably priced meals and cheap draught beer. Some of the local food here is crispy wantons with meat and vegetables in a pineapple glaze. It's very good, like nachos but better. We walked around Hoi An. It very pretty at night with little paper boats with candles floating down the river. Most places are little up with colourful lanterns. So far I really like the feel of Hoi An. There are also tailor shops everywhere!! I'm definitely going to have to exercise some restraint!