Hoi An (Best City in Vietnam!)

We left Nha Trang early in the morning!  This was our first time using the train. For a couple hours.

Our Early Morning Train!

After a long 8 or 9 hours we made it into Hoi An, or at least near there.  We then took a taxi to our guesthouse, which we shared with a nice English couple.  We finally got to our guesthouse and passed out for an awesome nap!  Then we headed  into the Old Town for some dinner on the water and exploring the city!

Cute Market with Lots of Lanterns!

 Dinner was delicious and then we headed back to our guesthouse for the night!  Tomorrow we were off to discover the Old Town and look into getting something Tailor made!

Fun Bridge Crossing the River

Japanese Covered Bridge

Typical Vietnamese 

Great Architecture in the Old City

We spent several days exploring the city and enjoying the views.  We also got some custom made clothes.  I got a suit, a dress, a coat, and a shirt all done.  They look beautiful and I can't wait to wear them when I get home.  It took several fitting and between Joel and I we did spend a lot of time in three different tailor shops.  It was tons of fun talking to the tailors and getting to know some of their stories.  We went to the nicest tailor shop, which was a crazy busy operation with lots of people running around.  We also went to a small time tailor who runs it the store with her sister.  She was very friendly and helpful!  Our last one was a spur of the moment by me random shop.  I got a coat made for 30 dollars.  Winter coat, custom fit, black and red, and it was made in less than a day! 

Other than walking around and spending time in the tailor shops we spent lots of time eating (shocking I know).  It was delicious!

We Took A Break From Vietnamese, and Had Indian Curry!  AMAZING!

Yummy Fresh Garlic Prawns

Amazing Taco's We Found, SO Delicious!

The Best Drinks We Had So Far on the Trip!

Nice View, Cider and the City!

Funny Food

We also went to an amazing tea house which is run by deaf people.  So the entire idea runs around the concept of silent tea, drinking in silence, and more importantly enjoying a couple moments of silence in a busy city.  This was one of the most amazing experiences in Hoi An.  It was a great place to try Vietnamese Tea, Cookies, and more importantly watch the city go by as we sat in silence. 

Our Delicious Tea and Cookies

Enjoying Our Quite Tea Time 

Hoi An was such an amazing place to visit.  We got to hang our the Old Town and relax, watch the locals, and try all this amazing food.  It is a bustling but also calm.  Really a great combination, so far definitely one of my favourite places in Vietnam, if not South East Asia.  I was a little upset to leave but excited to head to our last city in Vietnam Hanoi.  We hopped on the train for our next leg, overnight and 16 hours here we come!

Nha Trang (Beach Time!)

We took another bus from Mui Ne to Nha Trang which left at about 1:30 (read it picked us 2:30pm) and we arrived at around 8pm (I think, to be honest all the bus rides are kinda blending together in my head!)  We got dropped off in the middle of a crazy busy town!  Lots of lights, clubs, and restaurants, as well as the beach!  We headed off to our hotel where we dropped of our bags and headed out to dinner!

Nice View From the Bus

Yummy First Dinner in Nha Trang

We headed to bed then!  The next day we decided to explore the city, as there is a lot to explore.  Our first major discover was something called GOLDFISH!  I was so excited to see them, as I was craving them hardcore!

So AMAZING!

 We went to take a look at the beach and walk through the warm sand, the weather was not amazing as I am sure can see, but it was still nice to enjoy the sea air and the cold water!

Getting My Feet Wet!

Nice Beach!

Nice View of the Area!

 We then headed to lunch for a DELICIOUS lunch of Vietnamese cuisine.  It started with Spring Rolls, that we made, a delicious noodle/beef combo, and then of course a Mojito (with Lychee flavour).  All for something like 7 dollars per person!

Us Enjoying A Yummy Lunch!

Making Spring Rolls (Also see Mojito in the Background)

My Yummy Lunch!

After lunch we walked around some more for some more discoveries before heading to the Night Market, which was nothing compared to the markets in Chiang Mai, but always fun to go to a look at!  I even got myself a nice 1 dollar bracelet!

Nice Little (Very Little) Night Market!

Then it was off to dinner, we headed to a place famous for making your own BBQ!

Yummy BBQ!

And finally we ended the day with crepes we found on our walk home!  Pretty packed day, mostly filled with food!  But delicious and fun!

Crepes for the First, but NOT the Last Time!

The next day we headed to the pier for our snorkeling tour!  We heard that this was one of the nicest places in Vietnam to see some awesome fish!  So after a late pickup (traffic was VERY bad) we made it to the pier and on the boat.  We spend about 1 hour heading to our first location!  On the way we went by a floating market!

The Cool Floating Market We Went By!

Then we headed to the first spot, which was pretty awesome, after about an hour we headed to the second spot!  Also pretty great, this second place had some jelly fish though so I was careful.  Pretty cool stuff!  Then lunch and one more spot.  The sun did come out for a little, although it never got too hot, which was nice, cause that means NO SUNBURN!

We Also Got to Jump Off the Boat!

Rammy Ram Also Came Along for the Fun!

Heading Home After a Long Day Snorkeling!

After a whole day of snorkeling we headed to our hotel for a warm shower and then off to dinner. This time we had some sushi, which was cheap and delicious (not quite as good as Vancouver!)

We had one more day in Nha Trang which we spent more time on the beach and walking around.  It was nice to have some relaxing time hanging out in a city enjoying the food and not having to worry about much!  Then it is of to Hoi An for some tailoring and our last city on the beach! 

Enjoying Some Ice Cream Together!

Mui Ne

After leaving Ho Chi Minh we headed north to the Beach town of Mui Ne.  We planned to spend one full day there taking in the sights and the heading further north.  So we hopped on another sleeper train, this one left aroud 1 30pm and we got to Mui Ne about 8 30pm (apparently it is supposed to be a 6 hour ride!)  But we are definitely getting used to this kind of "on time" transit!

But we got to our nice room safe and sound!  It was pretty cool, and a nice view of the beach as well!  Oh and a pool :)

Our Nice Place, Check out the Pool!

Our Great Lunch!  More Pho for me!!

View From Our Room!

After lunch we headed out on a tour which would take us to Faerie Springs, the Red Dunes, and the White Dunes.  All of which are pretty popular around here!  So we waited for our jeep pick-up which was late (shocking!).  We hopped in the back of the jeep, which already had 6 people (although we had been assured that the tour would have 2-6 people, I guess 8 is same same!).  The we headed down the road, for about 2 min, to our first stop, the Faerie Springs.  Guess we could have walked there! 

Here we payed 5,000 Dong (about 25 cents) per person to walk through the river.  Pretty sure we didn't need to pay but some of those kids are pushy!  Oh well, it is not that much money! So we took our shoes off and hoped in the water (I was a little worried since I had some open wounds on my foot, but oh well, I will disinfect it when I get back to the room!)

Can You Find the Rammy Ram?

A View From Above, Pretty Cool!

Rammy Ram Came Along For the Ride!

The River We Walked Through

After the amazing walk through the Faerie Falls, which halfway through it poured, and I mean full out raining cats and dogs, we headed to the White Dunes.  I got absolutely soaked, Joel threw on a rain jacket real quick so I could put my camera under it!  I was not as quick but it felt nice to walk through the rain in the river.  Although it did mean we had to hop back in the jeep nice and wet!  Then it was about a 40 min drive along the ocean to the White Dunes! Here we walked around for a while, you can also rent a 4 X 4,  but we decided against it.  It was really fun to walk around and we hiked all the way to the top dune and had a nice view of the whole area!

View From the Dunes!

Heading to the Top of the Dune!

After spending some more time here, and drying off a little, and running down some dunes as fast as we could, we headed to the Red Dunes.  These are the ones I was really excited for, although they turned out less impressive then I expected.  The White Dunes were not too busy, the Red Dunes were PACKED!  People everywhere and kids trying to sell you sleds to ride down them on.  Pretty crazy. But the colouring of them was pretty cool!  We had fun!

Having Fun at the Red Dunes

The Amazing Colours of the Red Dunes

After spending the day wondering around Mui Ne we headed out for a delicious dinner and then off to bed, tomorrow we head north to Nha Trang, another beach town where we plan on going snorkeling!

Ha Tien and Ho Chi Minh (VIETNAM!!!!!)

Well we finally made it to Vietnam!  This is a country that I have been SO EXCITED about!  The food, the culture, the people, and the prices!  Love Love Love!  And so far it has been totally living up to my expectations!  Mostly :)

We left Otres at around 11 am and hoped in a mini-bus which quickly filled with people.  Luckily many of them hopped off before we got to the border so a packed bus ended up being just us two for the last hour or so!  Not too bad :)

Some of the Nice Views

 We got about 1KM from the border and we got told to get out of our minivan and hop on some scooters.  Ummm....ok?  Well we really had no option so we did!  Luckily it was an easy border crossing, although very bizarre!  We had to stop about 4 times to show our passport and leave our luggage on the scooters!  Sometimes they even went further off with our stuff, we were a little worried, but it all worked well!  We were the only people that got stopped, everyone else paid some money and kept going... So ridiculous!  But we made it through safe and sound with all our stuff still with us.  The gentlemen on the scooters dropped us off at our hotel in Ha Tien about 10KM from the border.  Not too shabby! We had a nice dinner on a boat on the water and went to bed because the next day we were headed to Ho Chi Minh city, another long travel day!

We woke up early to catch our bus.  Went downstairs and figured out that once again our hotel had not booked our bus.  Oh great, but luckily they booked us immediately on the next bus.  Well that's ok then!  So we got picked up and headed to a bus station.  From there we hopped on our first "sleeper bus" although we were traveling during the day.

Joel Sitting Comfy in Our Sleeper Bus!

We spent the next couple hours (8 I think) heading to the city!  Not too shabby!

A Nice Boat our Bus Took

More Cool Views from the Bus!

We arrived in Ho Chi Minh late and night and headed to our hotel, after getting a little lost with some help from the locals we got to our bed and got ready for a nice night of sleep.  But first dinner!

We Had Delicious Pho (Traditional Vietnamese Meal!)

Yummy Yum!

After our delicious dinner we walked around the town for a little, getting some fresh air and a slurpee! We also scooped out a nice place for me to get a manicure and pedicure.  Definitely planning on doing that some time during this stay!  But then back to bed for the night! Lovely Air conditioning and showers!  

Our first day we spent walking around the city.  Our first stop was the Reunification Palace.  

The Palace

After the Palace we headed to the War Remnants, unfortunatly it was closed at lunch time so we had some time to kill.  Guess what we did?  Food!

Our Amazing Drinks!

After a delicious lunch and then another stop for some Mojito's (We had to kill an hour and a half!)  we headed back to the Museum.  Both Joel and I had mixed emotions about this museum, although it was interesting to see, most of the information was very skewed to the Northern Vietnamese viewpoint. It was definitely interesting, but we only spent about an hour or less there.  It was very gruesome, in my opinion unnecessarily so in some cases, and then not very informative on the actual war itself.  The focus was too much on how terrible America was and how the whole world was against them being there.  Interesting to go to, but take things with a grain of sand, like most museums these days!   

We spent a lot of time in Ho Chi Minh walking around.  We also went to the famous markets in town and bought more than we should have (I had to buy a new bag because my day bag broke, I carry too much stuff!)  Joel bough new Sunglasses and he lost another pair! Lots of fun to walk around a bargain (I got about 50% off my bag!)  We also spent lots of time eating, our favourite place was the ABC Bakery! Amazing baguettes for only a dollar, with veggies, cheese, meat, and mayo!

Amazing Cake at ABC

Joel Enjoying a Baguette!

Yummy Shrimp Soup!

We also went to the movies for a night which was very interesting.  Cheaper for sure, but WAY louder and the people were talking during the movie.  An interesting view into daily life!  Something I feel most tourists don't do, but pretty fun!  Also the seats were all assigned, something to do with the Communist life maybe?

I of course also got a mani/ pedi which was very nice, I feel as if I am starting to get addicted to these.  It is going to be hard when I am back home and have to pay more than 3.50 for a French Manicure! Finally it was our last night in Ho Chi Minh as we are heading up to Mui Ne next.  Wish we could have stayed longer in this awesome city!  But don't worry I am sure I will be back!  And maybe next time I will be brave enough to do the Chu Chi Tunnels!