Category: Travel

Hoi An by boat

Hoi An is built in a maze of rivers and estuaries, with the actual ocean beach just down the road. We took the evening 30 minutes cruise, which involves walking down a shockingly rickety gangplank and riding around with about 300 other boats poled/paddled by people who do not have their captains licenses. The four of us felt a little awkward as the 90-lb grandmother heaved on her oar. Even so, very relaxing and pretty.

Toward the end of the ride, you float these little lanterns away for good luck.

A couple of days later, our hotel desk lady suggested we skip the usual taxi and take a boat ride into town.

Another rickety boarding experience, but a really pleasant ride into town.

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Look at me!

Here’s some random tourists standing in front of the Japanese Bridge, one of Hoi An’s proudest sights. Built in 1593.

How is it that a picture of yourself / your tribe standing in front of a thing is so much better than just a picture of a thing, or of somebody else in front of the same thing, or even just a picture of yourself?

I guess if we didn’t prefer our own faces, we could just hire one very very beautiful group to go have their pictures taken all over and call it a day. Then, after vacation we could just dial up the location and make up an album… the caption would be “I was there and it made me feel as good as those people look!”

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Palm View Villas

In the world of AirBnb and Booking.com and everything else, it’s easy to find a place to stay, but much harder to judge the quality of where you’re going to end up.

Our place in Hoi An was nice, except that the “2 baths” advertised meant “2 places to bathe” rather than “2 toilets.” Less than ideal for two couples, but we managed.

The breakfast was better than expected, a mix of local and Western choices.

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Down by the riverside

Hoi An is built on a bunch of rivers and estuaries. A lot of the nicer stuff is along one waterway or another. Early in the day it’s pretty peaceful.

By afternoon it’s cafe society time.

And at night it’s shoulder to shoulder.

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Good consumers

Besides the olde towne attractions, Hoi An is about buying stuff. So we did.

That attractive jacket, cotton and linen with a mandarin collar I’m going to regret, was $65, ready in the three days instead of two because they had to fix that vent that poked out funny.

Lee got a new pair of glasses for about half what she would have paid in NZ. We each got a pair of bespoke shoes. I nearly left mine on the boat today, but all’s well that ends well.

One of the themes of the failed Trump-Kim summit in Da Nang was the idea that North Korea could be just like Vietnam if they’d only embrace a more Western economy. I have no idea how people live in North Korea, but in the heavily touristy parts of Vietnam I’ve seen I can say that people are highly motivated by money and work really hard to get more of it.

It’s not always pleasant. Are their lives better? Are their leaders better off?

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Old Town Hoi An Sites

We bought the combo ticket good for up to five of the old town attractions, and we managed to find four to go in.

1. Phuc Kien Assembly Hall

One of several 19th century Chinese assembly halls. Shrines, sculpture, carvings, bonsai, etc. Very pretty but also easy to overdose. The spiral things hanging from the ceiling are long incense sticks that must burn for weeks or months.

2. The folkloric music performance

This was the most ham-fisted production I can ever remember seeing. Traditional instruments and seemingly well-trained musicians and singers and dancers, but all stuck behind a bunch of bad artistic choices. Flashing lights, sappy choreography, and then this:

3. The old merchant house

This was the neatest of the attractions we saw. A 300 year old house, supposedly in the current family’s hands for six generations.

The light in those pictures make them look painted.

One of the previous generations.

4. I can’t even remember

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Footpath? Sidewalk? Parking lot!

I guess it’s a sign of national progress that many people in Vietnam can afford scooters. But the national infrastructure hasn’t caught up, and so there’s approximately no parking lots. Luckily, there are sidewalks.

Pedestrians have to go between, through, and around, frequently stepping into the street. Where they are tooted at by more scooters.

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Good Morning Hoi An

After our unexpected night in Bangkok we made it to Da Nang uneventfully, were picked up at the airport as planned and got to the villa without any problems.

Sherry and Prov were already there, of course, and it was great to see them. We began our visit with a long wine-soaked lunch to catch up on all the news.

We spent most of the next few days in and around Hoi An proper. Pictures to follow in a bunch of upcoming posts.

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One night in Bangkok

We learned a bit about the true cost of buying a “hacker fare” on the trip from Bali to Da Nang. When we arrived at Bangkok’s Don Mueng airport, we had about an hour and a half to make our connection. But after queuing amongst a very tired Chinese tour group, we were told instead to report to immigration.

It turned out we weren’t making both legs on the same ticket, but rather we had two separate numbers. So, we had to actually land in Thailand and then re-exit.

By which time we had of course missed our flight. Some more anxiety and lines later, we found ourselves, tired, in the equally tired Amari hotel connected to the airport. We had dinner at Henry J Beans bar and grille, serenaded by a duo of local kids killing us softly with our songs. Or “kisen may sofy wisda soon” as we say in these parts.

We had a little dip in the hotel’s big pool and headed to the room. The big bed was magically soft and the A/C positively arctic, so we slept well. But we were still on our way out the door when our 4:45 wake up call rang.

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Crazy Rich Gringos

This guy Chris Salans has ridden the Ubud tourism wave to some significant successes. This picture is his cookbook for sale at the airport gift shop.

Chuck’s ex’s daughter went to school with Chris at Tufts. We ate at his second restaurant, called Spice, hoping to say hello. But he doesn’t actually show up much any more apparently.

The food was fine, with creative combinations, on a par with good resort town restaurants in the States,,, and US prices to match.

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Tegalalang rice paddies

After lunch we gambled that the rain would stop and headed to the World Heritage Site Tegalalang rice paddies.

The rain did stop and held off while I walked rim to rim to rim. Impossibly steep, intricately engineered waterways, lots and lots of tourists.

It was interesting to see different people navigate the muddy paths. I saw a Chinese girl in white ballet flats and a flowy pleated skirt do the whole walk without a drop of mud on her, and a European in sturdy REI travel clothes who was utterly covered in goop.

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Warung de Koi

We were hungry after all that coffee, and so we followed Kadek’s recommendation to lunch at the Warung de Koi. As a professional driver, he seemed to know the spots that would take care of us and also take care of him. Win win.

We sat in a little raised pavilion, open to the sides under a thick thatched roof and watched the rain fall into the koi pond. We enjoyed both the Western and Indonesian food. I couldn’t tell one Mie Goreng (fried noodles which I ate at least once each day) from the next, but they were all pretty good.

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Have another cup

Lee hadn’t seen a coffee plantation, and Chuck and I were both willing to do it again, so Kadek took us to one. See, said the guy who showed us around, like the Hollywood sign!!

The tour was pretty similar to the previous one, but a little better overall. Here’s some specimen plants, here’s the coffee processing, interactive this time…

Hot work and a hard life. I would not want to bet which of us is older.

Then on to the tasting, including a cup of the Kopi Luwak, the famous civet cat poop beans. For the record, it was a good cup of coffee, but I’m not gonna be shelling out the $50+ per pound on a regular basis.

We got to pet a sleepy (probably drugged, now I think of it) civet, and then exited through the gift shop.

Woulda bought a poo hunter t-shirt, but all they had was an Asian medium size… which I definitely am not.

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Tirta Empul

On our final full day in Ubud, our Airbnb host Kadek took us on a sightseeing tour. We originally planned to do a bike tour, but seeing the amount of traffic on the roads convinced us otherwise.

Luckily, Kadek is also a driver, so he knew just where to take us.

First stop, the ATM for another couple million rupiah. Second stop, the Tirta Empul holy water purification temple. Real Balinese Hindus come here to pray and wash away sins. The Eat, Pray, Love set (who constituted the majority of people we saw in the baths) do the same, although if anything they take it even more seriously. And tourists like us come to take pictures.

The temple grounds are really beautiful. I find the Balinese carvings and sculptures to be really evocative… their mythological creatures somehow seem just exactly mythological enough.

Everyone has to wear a sarong, which they give you on the way in.

The Balinese Hindu calendar seems to be neither lunar nor solar according to the explanations we got. There are ceremonies and rituals at odd intervals, and then more that happen for births, deaths, marriages, and so on. There’s a good time to start a business, a good time to get engaged, and so on. So with all that complexity, we had no idea what the big procession we witnessed was all about… but it was pretty impressive!

After all the offerings were put on a table, many of the marchers got to take a break in the shade. Out comes the phone, and snacks.

Then more parading of fancy and apparently weighty icons, and the big shaggy dragon brought up the rear.

It was all in all a really special place, mystifying but benignly so. Kadek did us a solid on the way out by getting the door guard to let us skip the enormous handicraft bazaar they funnel you through on the way out.

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