A perfect few days in Hoi An

For our first full day in Hoi An we decided to take advantage of the free bicycles that our accommodation offered. The streets were a lot quieter here so it made it much more pleasant. We were staying central to Hoi An, so we had the old town about a 15 minute cycle in one direction and then the beach a 10 minute cycle in the other. We picked up a map showing the good cycle routes around town so we headed out early to start exploring. It was a nice ride as the majority of it was on the smaller back roads, which were a lot less built up. As we reached the old town it became a lot busier, and impossible to get though the crowds so we parked up and had a wander around the shops. We were surprised that atleast every other shop was a tailors, and almost every local that approached us either worked at a tailors or 'knew someone' else who did. We stopped for lunch and by the time we came out the streets had almost emptied as it was now the hottest time of the day. We carried on for awhile but Alex was about to start sizzling if she stayed out any longer so we headed back and decided to do the rest later in the afternoon.

Old Japanese Bridge

The best part of the route was definitely saved till last. Lots of little country lanes and a chance to see the endless paddy fields.

The following day we headed out early to get a nice spot on the beach. We were trying to spend as little as possible this week after overspending in Dalat last, and we were both actually looking forward to a chilled day anyway. We got a couple of sun loungers in a quiet spot with a restaurant right behind us for drinks on tap, and settled down with a book. Sean also bought a new ball to play with so he was happy.

Our final day we went to a local cafe by the river and sat for a few hours organising the next part of the trip, catching up with family and doing the blog. When darkness fell we got back on the bikes and went to the old town again where we heard on an evening there was a night market. We couldn't believe how the place transformed. Lanterns lit the streets, and the atmosphere was so exciting. There were streets full of stalls selling food and souvenirs.

Sean is obsessed with these pop up cards.

We headed back but not before stopping at our favourite bakery that we'd been to every day for a brownie and some cake. Mmmm.

The next stop before heading all the way north was going to be Hué. It was only a few hours away so we were going to get a bus until we heard that we could get a private taxi for not much more, and make some stops at the main sights along the way that we otherwise wouldn't have seen. We only booked it the night before but sure enough they picked us up at our hotel the next morning. We first stopped at the Marble Mountains. For a small entrance fee you could walk all the way up and see the different pagodas and caves along the way.

Next we drove up Hai Van Pass. A long stretch of road that zig zags up and then back down the mountains, made famous to many after Top Gear featured it calling it 'one of the best coast roads in the world'. At the top we stopped for a chance to take pictures as the views were incredible.

Along the way we also drove past Lang co beach and a fishing village. It was nice having an easy comfortable journey for a change, even if it was just a short one. We arrived in Hué late afternoon and started planning for the next couple of days.

We both enjoyed our time in Hoi An though it was abit too touristy for Seans liking, but I personally loved it. Granted, there were not many sites to see and so the ones that there were, were over run with tourists but it was just nice to be somewhere quite 'pretty' and calm. It was so refreshing just being able to walk down the street without hearing a horn every 2 seconds or seeing rubbish everywhere. It was a small town so everything was just a short bike ride away, and the weather was perfect. Being in Hué definitely makes me miss it.

:)

Waterfalls, waterfalls and more waterfalls.

We started the day early so that Sean could practice driving the bike around the local streets before heading out into the busier areas. The drivers were impressed with how he did so we were off within the hour. The tour guide even bought him some gloves for the journey. The plan was to drive north through the Central Highlands where we would spend the night at Lak Lake, then the next day drive on to Buon Ma Thuot after stopping at 2 more waterfalls.

It was a nice drive out through the mountains, and along the way we made afew stops in some local villages. First we were shown a flower farm where we saw millions of Gerberas and Roses. Next we were shown where the very popular weasel coffee is made. We've learnt that Vietnam is the third biggest country for coffee production. Number 1 being Columbia and number 2 being Brazil. Sean never really used to like coffee but we heard how good it was here so when we first arrived we tried weasel coffee and Sean seemed to really like it, saying it had a nice chocolatey taste. Apparently you can actually get it in the UK but we had never heard of it so had no idea how it was made. It turns out that weasels eat the coffee beans and then poo them out. It's all collected and this creates the unique taste of weasel coffee. It's actually really expensive and you only get about 2 sips worth in a glass.

Coffee with a view

A sleeping weasel

Weasel coffee

Flower farm

The next stop we made was at a place where they make rice wine. We'd already seen the process on a tour in Ho Chi Minh but our guide didn't speak the best English and it only took a few minutes. The stops were also a nice break from the ride, and gave us chance to stretch our legs. We also got to see these really weird jars full of wine with huge lizards and snakes stewing in them.

Laughing Buddha

Floating homes on the river

Our accommodation at Lak Lake was classed as a homestay, but the place where we slept was a separate building, a bit like a huge barn with 2 mattresses on the floor and mosquito nets and it was pretty much open to the outside. At first it seemed nice enough and was interesting staying somewhere different but as soon as we turned the lights on once it came dark, there were huge swarms of bugs and flies! We should have expected it with it being rainy season and in the middle of the country side, but it was just crazy! From then on we just stumbled around in the dark. The restaurant was the worst though. No exaggeration there must have been thousands of flies with huge wigs (not house flies). One landed in my rice but the tour guide was quick to pick it out and apologise. As you can imagine Alex didn't sleep much that night.

Homestay

The next day we had the final leg of the journey to Buon Ma Thuot, and the first waterfall we visited on the way there was Gia Long. We were told we could swim here so we already had our swimwear on. When we eventually found a way down to the bottom though there was nobody there and we had no idea if we were even at the right bit. We honestly must have been stood at the edge of the water for about 20minutes egging each other on to swim across first. This was really testing my fear of water as we couldn't see a thing and had no idea how deep it was. I was trying my hardest to get Alex to get in the water first. She finally just went for it which then made me look like a wimp so I had no choice then but to follow. We quickly got across to the other side where Alex then banged her knee on the rocks so jumped out. We took a few snaps then I thought I saw a way back across without swimming but how wrong I was. Stepping on a rock under water was unbelievably slippy and before I knew it I was falling in the water... On my own! So scary!

In the midst of all the excitement of swimming we forgot to get a good photo of the waterfall haha oops.

We had been so careful keeping our clothes dry and typical us we had forgotten our towels so we tried drying off in the sun before getting them back on. Turns out we could have just jumped in fully clothed because as soon as we got back to the bikes it started raining so hard and within afew seconds we were soaked through.

We set off to the next waterfall, as normal, us leading and Sean behind on his bike. He was never far behind and if he did get caught up the driver would always pull in and wait. So you can imagine how scared I was when we pulled in after driving through what felt like a hurricane, on the bendy roads through the woods, and Sean didn't come around the corner. We waited awhile and he still didn't follow so the driver turned around and went back to look for him. That next few minutes felt like a lifetime, and I've honestly never been so scared in my entire life. We carried on driving back and we'd actually gone a lot further than I thought without him behind us but just as I was about to have a heartattack and was thinking he'd driven off into a ditch, there he was stood at the side of the road next to the bike. Panic over. Turns out the bike I was on didn't have a break light so when we went around a corner quite quick Sean didn't realise how much of a sharp corner it was so couldn't break quick enough. It didn't help that his breaks barely worked especially when they were wet. It was unbelievably lucky that it was a wide area to stop at that point in the road or else he defintely would have come off. The backpack that was tied on the back flew off which is why he had to stop.

The rain let off abit as we got to Dray Sap waterfall but started again just in time for us setting off to the accommodation. By the time we got to the hotel we were so cold and were dripping wet.

The nicest tour guide you could ever meet. 

From Buon Ma Thuot we decided to go straight up north to Hoi An. It was going to be at least an 11 hour journey so it was either fly or get the sleeping bus. It didn't take long to choose when we compared prices. We caught the bus at 4.30pm and arrived the next day at around 4am. The journey was a lot better than we thought and we both managed to get a decent night sleep surprisingly. The bus was like a normal coach but all the seats were like bunk beds. It was a good experience. The only annoying bit was that the drivers barely spoke any English so when they woke us and told us we were there, we got off and assumed either there would be taxis or another bus to take us to the centre of Hoi An. But no, it was 4 in the morning and we were literally in the middle of nowhere with just 2 guys repeatedly asking us 'motorbike?! motorbike?! You want motorbike?!' We didn't have many options so eventually we got the price down and both hopped on the same bike to our accommodation. Luckily the hosts are really nice and got us a drink and showed us to our room even though we were about 7 hours too early for check in.

Sean excited for the night ahead. 

Sleeping bus

As we're writing this we're currently on our third day in Hoi An and it's been sooo nice so far. More on that to come.

:)

Don't go chasing waterfalls

The bus journey to Dalat was so much better than we anticipated. Once we got off the busy streets of Nha Trang we started heading into the countryside and the views were amazing. The roads were so bendy, and we were going higher and higher into the mountains. We kept trying to get some good photos but the camera really didn't do it any justice.

Being so high up meant that the temperature was significantly cooler here and as soon as we got off the bus we felt it. It was actually quite refreshing though. Dalat was so different then anywhere that we had been so far and it felt really relaxing to be here.

We were staying in a backpackers hostel, and had a room on the very top floor so had great views over the hillside. The management was fantastic and straight away told us about the night market that was happening. We had literally just been saying how strangely quiet it was on the streets... until we turned a corner and found everyone.

It was packed. There were so many stalls selling fruit, veg, sweets, clothes, shoes, souvenirs, woolly hats and scarves, knitted jumpers, the list could go on. It was quite exciting to be there and we didn't get hassled half as much which meant we could actually look a lot closer.

The next day we were debating which waterfalls to see but all of the bus tours were so expensive and you only got to see one waterfall at a time. So instead we asked the manager and he said to write down everywhere we wanted to visit and he would sort it for us. He arranged 2 drivers for us with motorbikes, for 2 days, to see 5 different waterfalls. The price was much more on our level so off we went.

The drivers were so kind and friendly and even though we were only paying for the waterfall tours, they still stopped off for us to let us stop to pictures of the views, and visit the old railway station and some other little sites.

Now for the waterfalls...
For us, each one was so different, the journeys there and the little hikes down to each one but we know to others it's a lot of the same thing so we've summarised as much as we can. In person they were amazing though.

The first day we went to see Datanla Falls, and Tiger falls.
Datanla was the closest to Dalat so it was very busy and crowded. Tiger falls on the other hand was much further away and when we got there there wasn't a soul in sight, except for a little old lady laying in a hammock who we bought tickets from.

Datanla

Tiger Falls (spot Sean)

The guys took us to a local restaurant for lunch. It wasn't somewhere that we would have chosen to go from the outside but the food was so good!

Day 2 began by visiting Prenn waterfall. Again this was the closest so a lot more tourists. They also did elephant rides here but Alex is a bit sceptical about doing it in certain places when you don't know how they're looked after. We've already done some research into some proper elephant sanctuaries for later on in the trip anyway so we weren't too bothered about not doing it here.

Prenn

Walking behind the falls

Next was Pongour waterfall. This is the largest but again it was very quiet with hardly anyone there as it's further away.

Tried setting the timer to get one of us both

Finally was the Elephant falls. This took a lot more climbing to get down to and obviously when we got there Sean couldn't resist climbing even further.

Finding a cave behind the falls

Our drivers told us about another tour that we could do with them to move on to the next place, which included spending a night half way. The price was so much more than we could afford though and they even brought it down a lot for us (eventually to almost half) but we just couldn't stretch our budget that far. Long story short we eventually decided on taking one guide who would drive Alex and then I would drive the second motorbike. I've literally been dying to get on one since we got to the Philippines so this was perfect!

We were about to head out for dinner that night when we passed out tour guides and the hotel management having some beers outside and they immediately insisted we sat down and joined them. It turned out to be a really good night just chatting to them all about our different lives.

:)

Fun fact... We found out eating dog meat here is a lot more common that we first thought :/ we actually didn't even know they ate it here at all.