Culture and Rain

This story was posted under the categories: Big Asia Trip, Cycling South-East Asia, Vietnam

After coming down from the mountains, it was time for our last stop in Vietnam. We hesitated a very long time if we would go to these 2 cities as it would be a detour on our way to Laos. The fact that Ine was sick made the choice easier: visiting some cities and indulge ourselves in some culture would give I the rest I needed. If we would have known that it was THIS cold (they warned us that it could be a little bit colder here), and that on top of it, it was raining we might have considered another option. But nevertheless…

We first stopped in Danang, one of Vietnam’s larger cities, but not a popular tourist stop as most of the tourists head straight for Hoi An (40km away) or Hue (100km away). Only 2 days after Tet the whole city still was celebrating. All shops were closed and the only thing we could do was exploring a fair, something like our “kermis”, but with much more foodstalls . Although Danang captured us for a day, the city has not much more to offer than a medium sized supermarket, some western style cloth shops and (of course we are in Asia) a dozen of GSM stores. So after strolling around and relaxing we decided to cycle to Hoi An.

Hoi An is known as the Ancient city of Vietnam. This quiet riverside town is dotted with temples, Chinese style tile-roofed wooden old houses, little cosy alleys and ancient Assembly Halls. The whole town is listed as UNESCO world heritage site. Nowadays there is little left of this original Southeast Asian trading port and the whole town is a big tourist trap, but a nice one. Wandering the little streets lined with yellow houses even pleased us. I could of course not resist the many tailor shops and got a custom made pair of pants. It took them like half a minute to take my sizes, another 15 seconds to let me choose the fabric and less than 24 hours later and 17 euros lighter I could pick up my new pants. Gregory already wished that buying new cloths could always be this easy

As good tourist we bought our entrance ticket for the old town, which allowed us to visit one museum, see an old house, go to a traditional performance and enter an ancient assembly hall. As Ine & Gregory we ended up skipping 2 of the 5 possible attractions. We started with the very nice Phuc Kien assembly hall. It’s the biggest of all remaining
halls and has the most dragons . We continued our way to a museum, it was supposed to be something about folk, or at least that’s what it said in the brochure… And finally went to see an old house: a wooden house with a big tourist shop inside.
The next day, still longing for more culture we went on our first guided tour this trip and headed of in a big bus full of tourists for My Son an ancient sanctuary. For us it really was an adventure being part of a bus full of white people and following a guide to the entrance to discover there that as always the tourists are ripped off. Of course the guide did not accompany us inside the historical site and of course there was not that much to see besides some piles of bricks in the jungle.

We still wanted more culture, yeah I must have been really sick, and went to see a little pagoda outside Hoi An. Not mentioned in most guidebooks, but for us the most beautiful sight in this city.

After Hoi An it was time to cross the High Van Pass for our next destination Hue, the historical capital of Vietnam and our last stop before we will continue to Laos. Due to bad weather (yes it really was cold and it was raining) we had to go and shop for new warmer cloths. With the rain it was not that fun to wander around the ancient town with it’s own replica of the Chinese Forbidden City, the many Temples and Pagodas. Eventhough many monument were destroyed during the war it still has a very impressive Citadel-complex. Not to forget to mention that the Vietnamese keep on suprising us… in the Imperial Palace there still are more than 100 buildings that needs restauration, but… they choose to use the UNSECO money to restore ….. the tennis court

We even found a bicycle store that was able to fix Greg’s bike, so that we can continue to Laos without worries. That left us nothing more than to do as the Vietnamese and celebrate Valentine in the cold (they really don’t have any heathing anywhere and for some reason they refuse to keep the doors and windows closed brrr…) with a big chocolate valentinescake.