Hoi An is one of those places every tourist passes through if they're in central Vietnam. This port town has become a must-stop thanks to its distinctive style, its tourist-friendly vibe and its history. The architecture is genuinely unusual, and the semi-pedestrian streets of the old quarter are something of a rarity in the country.
I call Hoi An the toy town because its buildings look like dolls' houses — straight out of a children's picture book. Lovely, curious, neatly packed little houses; one after another making up the old quarter. I'd call it the Bruges of Vietnam, because it gave me a very similar feeling to that Belgian city.
To get to Hoi An from Hué we took a train to Da Nang, one of Vietnam's largest cities, separated from Hoi An by an enormous 30-kilometre stretch of beach known as China Beach.
On the train I made a new friend
In Da Nang we shook off the taxi drivers and motorbike riders who swarmed us the moment we stepped off the train, and made our way to a quieter corner to check the train schedule for future journeys.
While I was reorganising my backpack, another taxi driver came over — same friendly approach, same intention — and I replied with a firm "BYE!" without looking up. Ilze says the look on his face was priceless, but after so much persistent selling you have to be blunt or you won't move more than a metre per minute.
We left our taxi driver friend at the station and walked a couple of streets to find one of the stops for the yellow bus line that connects Da Nang with Hoi An. After some back and forth we ended up paying the local fare — no surcharge for foreigners, no charge for luggage: 20,000 dong per person.
At the time, one euro equalled roughly 27,400 Vietnamese dong, so 20,000 dong came to about 72 cents.
Yellow bus line connecting Da Nang and Hoi An
Once in Hoi An, after doing our usual round of hotels, we found a decent room for $7 and got to work exploring the city.
We found that, because of Tet, many shops were still closed. It might seem incredible to anyone who hasn't been to Vietnam during Tet — a country so vibrant and energetic, grinding almost completely to a halt for two weeks after the new year — but it's entirely true. Only a fraction of businesses stay open, and train and bus services are cut back to the bare minimum.
A typical house in Hoi An
On the other hand, because of Tet all the pagodas — Vietnamese temples — were wide open, with no entrance fee. We seized the chance and visited them one after another until we'd had our fill, until they started becoming just "another pagoda" — the same thing that happens to us with castles and churches.
One of the first pagodas we visited
Dragon statue in the gardens of one of the pagodas
All the lanes of the old quarter are packed with shops, little stalls and vendors, but the food is concentrated along the banks of the Thu Bon river.
River at sunset
There we sampled some of the local specialities, including:
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Cao Lau: Hoi An's signature dish, found on practically every corner and available in different variations. It's a surprisingly layered recipe for something so compact: flat noodles, lettuce leaves, cucumber and other vegetables, slices of pork, pork crackling, and a tasty liquid sauce almost like a soup. Sometimes they add mint, rice crisps or egg. A must-try if you pass through Hoi An — you'll find it for 20,000–30,000 dong.
Hoi An's signature dish: Cao Lau
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Banh Can Trung: an egg cooked inside a tiny crispy crêpe. Crunchy and delicious. And at just 10,000 dong a plate, basically free.
Banh Can Trung: Hoi An-style eggs
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Banh Xeo: a crispy crêpe with peanut sauce, similar to the one in Hué, but eaten wrapped inside a sheet of rice paper — the kind used for spring rolls.
What Banh Xeo crêpes look like
And this is how you eat your Banh Xeo
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Hoanh Thanh: a crispy, oily pastry topped with minced meat, onion and carrot.
Tasty but greasy: Hoanh Thanh
After exploring the city we decided to check out the surroundings, so we walked the few kilometres from Hoi An to the peaceful stretch of sand called Banh Beach, which is just the start of China Beach.
The sand was covered in shells
To get there we walked through rice paddies and rural Vietnam, which turned the walk into a lovely experience in itself.
Vietnamese fishing boats
Rice paddies on the outskirts of Hoi An
After a day walking by the sea, we decided to do it again and head in the direction of Da Nang on foot instead of catching a bus — that walk is covered in walking China Beach.
