Wow. What a beautiful and mesmorising place! We were unsure if weve like Hoi An as we'd been warned how touristy it is. But oh how we were wrong. We loved it.
Rocky start to our visit
Unfortunately we started off to a rocky start in Hoi An, after weeks of stomach troubles that took a turn for the worse our first night there, I decided it was time I got checked out. And so we spent our first proper day in Hoi An at the hospital. Which sucked. But, the care I received was amazing, they ran a bunch of tests, set us up in a lovely private room to wait, explained everything to me, gave me a cost breakdown before doing any tests. and after about 6 hours I left with a bag of meds and a mind clear of any anxiety that it was something more serious (note to self, never google symptoms).
I was determined to not waste anymore of the day, so we walked from the hospital into the main old quater of Hoi An, stopping for an unreal Banh Mi from a pretty famous spot along the way. We then spent the rest of the afternoon wandering around the beautiful old quater, taking note of things we wanted to come back an explore.
I was pretty physically and emotional exhauated by the late afternoon so we spent the evening resting at the hostel, and ventured a whole two doors down to this very cute, highly rated little restaurant for dinner. It was absolutely fantastic though, and so cheap! About £1.15 for a bowl of Pho!
Soaking up the history
Although I still wasnt 100%, we wanted to make the most of everyday in this beautiful city.
The old quater of Hoi An is packed with sights of historical significance, a melting pot of japenese, chinese and Vietnamese culture and history in one walkable distance. To visit these sights, you have to buy a "ticket" to the old quarter which grants you entry to 5 sights of your choosing. You can walk around the quarter freely without a ticket of course, but wouldnt be able to see any of the historic sights.
We had a hard time picking which places to visit, but settled on:
Every sight we went to was stunningly beautiful and fascinating. From the japanese style temples and gates, to the wooden ancient houses thay showcased how people lived in Hoi An. We loved it! Found it particularly interesting to hear how the ancient houses have been built to cope with the flooding that often happens to Hoi An. They built pully systems inside the house, so that if flooding starts to happen they can load furniture onto a pully and bring it up to the first floor and save it from any damages! We also saw in one house markers of how high recorded floods have been, particularly scary the recent flood in 2022.
The funniest part though was the famous Japanese Bridge. The bridge many people will have seen when doing any research into Hoi An. We spent ages trying to find it, walking past it time and time again...because it's been covered up and deconstructed for repairs! We had no idea it was closed, and the iron sheets we we're walking past was covering it up. Oops!
While walking home, we stumbled across the most beautiful gallery, The Precious Heritage Museum. The gallery dispayed a series of stunning and moving photographs of tribal women from rurual Vietnamese villages. The photographer Réhahn, spents years travelling Vietnam with the aim to visit and photograph every small tribal village in Vietnam, as well as document and share their culture, community traditions and traditional dress. For many of his visits, he was gifted a traditional dress from the leader of the tribes, which were showcased alongside the photographs.
This has to be one of the most beautiful galleries I've been too. The way Réhahn captured so much emotion, feeling and stories in the photographs was breathtaking. The way the gallery was curatied also contributed to this though, the space was dark and dramatic with large A0 copies of the photographs on the black walls, backlit for added impact. Everything about it was so thought through and beautiful.
Of course, we had to buy some prints of our favourites photos. Id have loved to buy some in a bigger size, but due to space were only able to get them in A5, but i cant wait to display these in our house.
Getting out of the bustle
The highlight for us thought was renting our pushbikes and going on a really long bike ride. First went out on a ride to a tourist hotspot called the bamboo baskets. Which we did not enjoy! Essentially, you pay to do a short boat trip through the mangroves in a round bamboo basket, but along the way they play music, dance in the boats, rock the boats and spin the boats in circles. Along the way there's upsale opportunities for boat karaoke, to move to a specific boat that spins super quickly, or to fish? All very random and just so touristy. It was an entertaining experience but felt quite overpriced and definitely over the hyped.
However the cycle there was lovely! After that, we went on a long 10k cycle to a place I found on google maps called "vegetable village", and as a budding veg patch gal I couldn't not go. I wont get chance to grow any veggies this year as we'll be coming back home too late in the year to start, but I'm always up for getting some inspiration as to what to grow and how to grow things! We cycled there not knowing what to expect, and it was just basically a giant allotment but I LOVED it!! Was so peaceful and beautiful!
Too wrap up that wholesome day cycling around beautiful landscapes and through picturesque ricepaddies, Chris and I took advantage of free drinks for 15 minutes at the hostel, got ropped into signing up for a pool competition and after way to many beers ended up also in a karaoke contest 🤣 was definitely not how we expected our evening to end but it was actually very fun!
The famous lanterns of Hoi An
It wouldnt be a trip to Hoi An without talking about the lanterns that line the streets and by day illuminate the streets, the lanterns that make Hoi An so famous. I must say, Hoi An at night is as magical as it looks online. It almost reminded me of being a teenager and no room was ever complete without fairy lights - the day I moved to uni, the first thing I put up was my fairy lights and instantly it felt like home and so much cosier. The how city just has such a cosy, warm feeling to it.
While in Hoi An we knew we wanted to make our own lanterns to bring home with us. By this time, we'd already decided we'd be sending home a box of stuff before we left Vietnam so it felt like the perfect opportunity to pick up some bigger souvenirs as we'd only be carrying them for a short time. Crafty Morrighan was very excited for this activity, chris less so. He was excited to do it but not so much for how fiddly and intricate it would be to make. But actually, it was easier than we both expected, even with us choosing to also make the bamboo frame for the lantern and then cover it, rather than buying a premade frame to cover.
It took us about an hour to make one lantern each, and we learnt locals take about 8 minutes!😅 But we loved it! We got to pick 4 peices of fabric to cover our lanterns, and also a coloured tassle to hang from the bottom.
And to wrap up our wonderful time in Hoi An we went on a slow boat ride down the river at nighttime, surrounded by lantern lit boats. It's definitely not a hidden gem of an activity, from the riverside it looked packed, but actually once we got on the boat it felt more quiet and peaceful. It was a really magical way to end the trip! And for only £4 for half an hour, there was nothing to complain about!
All in all, we absolutely loved Hoi An and we're actually pretty sad about leaving! It's a city I can totally see ourselves returning to in the future. Such fascinating history, stunning architecture, beautiful surrounding landscapes, and unreal food (cao lau will forever be in my heart, and will get a big shout out in my top 10 Vietnamese food highlights)
Until next time Hoi An. We loved you
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