Rich and I had heard really amazing things about Hoi An, Vietnam, and Hoi An came through! We stayed in an amazing AirBNB with one of our favorite hosts, ate delicious meals, and enjoyed wandering and exploring each day.
Rich and I felt a bit sick and rundown in Ho Chi Minh City, and we know long stretches of travel can do that to you. We still enjoyed our time there and found a few gems we would definitely revisit if we ever make our way back.
Day 63: Travel from Hue to Hoi An on a SLEEPING Bus
So the bus ride from Hue to Hoi An was only about four hours long, but the only type of bus available for the journey is a sleeping bus.
Unfamiliar with a sleeping bus? We were too. Instead of having normal bus seats, you recline for the ride so you are able to get some sleep.
Once you go sleeping bus, you will never want to go back. Despite being a few inches taller than the typical passenger and perhaps needing another inch or two of leg room, the seats were remarkably comfortable. It was also great to have your own space (no offense, honey!) for the ride.
10/10 experience. Sleeping bus for the win.
We got to Hoi An and got a bit turned around when the google directions took us to the wrong address for our AirBNB (we were on foot with our luggage on the wrong road…), but our hostess Vuong somehow found us on her motorbike and graciously drove us to the right location.
The AirBNB was beautiful. We had arrived!
Day 64: Enjoying the Beach in Hoi An
Our AirBNB included breakfast, which the first morning was fresh fruit in the refrigerator which I cut hacked open with the largest knife I have ever seen.
Then it was time to head to the beach! Our AirBNB included the use of two bicycles so we pedaled about 20 minutes through the town, then over rice fields to the beach. Cycling is not my favorite– I also think my bike was a little bit broken– but we made it.
The Beach at Hoi An
We paid about a quarter to have someone watch our bikes, and then the second we stepped on sand, we received offers for cheap prices for beach chairs. As we walked, the prices got lower until we arrived at a spot offering free chairs if you bought lunch. Rich asked if we could buy drinks instead and received a pretty nebulous answer that we took as a yes.
We settled in with a beer (Rich) and coconut juice (Amanda) to enjoy some sun! And this sun was hot! I was still overcoming the trauma of the jellyfish attack so Rich and I opted to stay out of the water.
When it came time to pay, of course, the restaurant added the price of the chairs to our bill. We negotiated adding an order of french fries and two beers (beers were about 75 cents a piece) to our order to come out even so it worked out in the end.
Banh Mi for Lunch
We rode our bikes back to town for a much less expensive and very delicious banh mi lunch. We got two banh mi sandwiches with fresh avocado and two cans of coke for $3.75 total.
Banh mi have saved our budget as we traveled through Vietnam.
Dinner and Lights in Pretty Hoi An
Hoi An at night is pretty spectacular. There are lights and lanterns everywhere, and there is an amazing Japanese bridge connecting the two sides of the river. On the river itself, visitors light “lantern flowers,” representing individual hopes and prayers, and send them out to float. It’s magical.
I found a fabulous restaurant called Nu online. We are pretty in touch with what we want in a restaurant at this point, and top criteria includes:
- Vegetarian and vegan options. I’m not a vegetarian or vegan yet (ha!), but my experience says that places with vegetarian and vegan offerings are just more likely serve healthier food in general. I also eat vegetarian as much as I can to get enough nutrients to make up for the days we are subsisting on coffee, Oreos, and noodles (doesn’t happen often but has happened– Mom, you raised me better).
- Fusion dishes. I’m sure it would be sexier and make us sound more adventurous to say we only eat 100% authentically local dishes abroad. We don’t. When a place gets good reviews from Westerners, it’s a good indication that we will probably like it too.
- A small menu. We almost always like restaurants that specialize in a few items more than places that have the Cheesecake Factory-sized binder of choices. We are not picky– we can find something we will like on a small menu.
At Nu, we started with pork belly bao buns, and then had a beef noodle ragu and fried rice with sesame chicken entree, and then enjoyed a small cheesecake dessert. Yum.
Day 65: Work Day and Pretty Night Out
After no internet on the Halong Bay cruise and an active 24 hours in Hue, we desperately needed to get caught up on blogging and trip planning. Our AirBNB host Vuong brought us egg banh mi for breakfast, and then we spent the whole day inside knocking out work. It was glorious.
Hoi An was one of the most picturesque (read: Insta-ready) places we had visited so we ran out before sunset to take as many pictures as possible.
While taking pictures around 5:30 PM, we realized we had not eaten since breakfast and were STARVING so we grabbed a quick pre-dinner banh mi. Which I then immediately spilled on my shirt– changing our Insta capturing approach. Oops!
For dinner, we went back to Nu. It was that good.
Day 66: Travel to Ho Chi Minh City and American Lunch
Travel to Ho Chi Minh City (previously Saigon) was super easy. A shuttle picked us up from our hotel and drove us to the airport in Danang, about an hour away. We took one quick and easy flight to HCMC, and we were there around 11:30 AM. There was a local bus from the airport to the city, and we were in our AirBNB by 12:30 PM.
For lunch, we found an American sandwich shop called Journey’s, and it was like being back in America. Beyonce and Jay-Z on the stereo, crispy bacon on our BLT, and delicious air conditioning.
We were so full our dinner consisted of snacks (read: Oreos) from the Circle K. So like basically we had the most American day ever.
Day 67: Visit to the War Remnants Museum and the Reunification Palace
The War Remnants Museum
After our visit to the Hoa Lo Prison in Hanoi, we were prepared for the War Remnants Museum to tell a decidedly North Vietnam/communist-friendly account of the conflict, and I think that is a pretty fair assessment of what we experienced at the museum.
I’m mostly glad we went because it certainly deepened my understanding of the history surrounding us in HCMC (Saigon at the time), but the images were especially sad. The effects of Agent Orange were devastating, and the how young soldiers on both sides of the war were was striking. For better or worse, war can seem abstract in America, but in so many places we have visited (Croatia, Malta, Vietnam), war is something that happened on that corner, and it is not abstract at all.
If you are in HCMC, I would recommend visiting the War Remnants museum, and I would also recommend a big lunch and a nap afterwards. It was deep, and I know I needed to retreat and recover to process a bit after our visit.
The “Reunification” Palace
This is a government office building used by the Americans and South Vietnamese during the Vietnam War. On April 30, 1975, a North Vietnamese bulldozer rammed through the Palace’s front gate, signifying the fall of Saigon and an end to the war. The Americans had finished evacuating the day before.
The Vietnamese call it the Reunification Palace because they celebrate the reunification of North and South Vietnam. The South Vietnamese ex-pats refer to this time in history as Black April.
The palace is fascinating because everything in it has remained untouched. It is like walking on to a Vietnamese set of Mad Men. It is also one more reminder that this was a war fought in our parents’ lifetime.
The heaviness of the day wore us out. We went home, ordered Indian delivery food for dinner, and ate on the couch in our pajamas.
Day 68: Rest, Recovery, and Rooftop Bar
Rich woke up feeling terrible with a sore throat. We picked up hot tea and a Gatorade equivalent at the Circle K and stayed inside to rest and recover.
I have no way to back this up, but I think some of the air pollution was getting to us. There is so much exhaust in the city, and people cook, using a variety of fuel sources, out on the sidewalk. My throat was okay, but my breathing just felt a bit labored. Add clean air to the list of American things I take for granted.
After a day inside, we decided to head out to a rooftop bar to take in another view of Saigon. The bar was located on the 28th floor of the Sheraton, and the views were really amazing. We were glad we ventured out.
Day 69: More Rest Needed and Change of Plans
Rich woke up feeling better but not great. We had some pho from the restaurant downstairs for lunch, and then we headed to an incredible coffee shop named The Workshop to work. I was able to blog a bit while Rich worked on travel planning.
Our original plan had been to head to Sihanoukville, Cambodia from Ho Chi Minh City. However, the only way we could figure out to get there without spending way more on a flight than we wanted to spend was to take a 13+ hour bus ride (on a sitting not sleeping bus– the horror!). While there have been points in the trip that we have “toughed out” some situations, neither of us were quite feeling up to a 13 hour bus ride on a route that had a few particularly unsettling reviews.
So we decided to go to Thailand instead! In my humble opinion, something I really appreciate about our marriage is the agility with which Rich and I change course when we decide it is the right thing to do (travelling this year being a prime example). And a flight to Thailand and a hotel with a pool when we arrived sure sounded like a win.
While we didn’t see quite as much in Ho Chi Minh City as we had planned, we enjoyed its modern feel as well as being able to learn from its significant history. Stay tuned for how we enjoyed our last minute change of plans to visit Chiang Rai, Thailand!