🇻🇳 Hoi An & Da Nang

We reach Hoi An by bus on January 28th and are finally looking forward to warmer temperatures. As soon as we arrive, we can walk to our hotel in our T-shirts. ☀️👍🏼 (Of course only after we got rid of the pushy taxi drivers). It's finally warm and the sun is peeking out from behind the clouds. We meet many tourists who ride through the old town on ferry bikes. We first move into our room in the “Hoi An Dream City Hotel”, which is centrally located in the city center and is about 1km away from the water or hotspot of the old town. We find lots of cafes and restaurants in the immediate vicinity. We want to have lunch and approach the decorated, colorful old town.

We sit down in a restaurant and are initially shocked by the high prices 😅 we order coffee and “fried rice”. We are full but soberingly realize that we would have liked better quality given the prices.

In the next few days we will go to a very good vegetarian restaurant on our street and try the traditional dish 🍽️ Hoi An special Noodle with Tofu: Cao lãu tô. Extremely tasty and filling.

The old town is of course nice to look at with its characteristic yellow house facades, which are still in great shape, and all the lanterns and lights. The range of tailor shops is huge: you can have suits, gowns and/or dresses made to measure on every corner. There are countless souvenir shops, restaurants and I can't remember how many times sellers asked us on the water if we wanted to go boating. There were hardly any boats on the water during the day, but even more so in the evening 🙃 when it gets dark and the lights come on in the city, the atmosphere becomes magical and the old town is bursting at the seams. (At least in high season when we were there). There are countless boats on the move and people sit in the front row in the restaurants to watch what's going on. The only advantage in the evening: you can better avoid the sellers' inquiries, because with these crowds, they can't appeal to everyone 😄

We try to avoid the hustle and bustle, but this is hardly possible. Here too the traffic is enormous. No matter where you want to go, the scooters come through every small alley and as a pedestrian you always have to be attentive. We quickly got fed up with the location close to the center of the city center and booked accommodation far outside in the countryside for 2 nights. And we won't be disappointed...

In the accommodation “Hoi An Osaka Riverside Villa&Spa” we get a modern and large, beautiful room with a balcony and this view ⤴️ we even have a bathtub and an outdoor pool. It is a family run hotel and everyone is extremely friendly. We can also rent bikes here and ride them to the sea 🌊 and explore the area outside the city center by bike. We are right in the green and the surroundings are quiet, a stark difference from the previous location. When we want to go to the restaurant or the supermarket, we walk past countless fields where the locals are busy gardening and growing vegetables until the evening.

We have a delicious and extensive breakfast in the hotel and on the second evening we also eat at the accommodation by prior arrangement (dinner costs extra).

We leave Hoi An on February 2nd and take a taxi to Da Nang, just a 40 minute drive away.

We stay for one night in the “Phú An Hotel”, which is located in the immediate vicinity of the Dragon Bridge and offers an amazing view of the city from the roof terrace (with pool). Of course we also walk the 3-4 kilometers to the sea or the promenade and suddenly feel like we are in a completely different world. Beach, palm trees, sea... I think Da Nang is also called the Miami of Vietnam and there's even something to that 😊☀️🌊🌴 ⤵️