Vietnam – 6-29 Mar2018

By Kathleen Ennen / March 29, 2018

MAR 6-10, 2018 – Hanoi

OK – we’re now in Hanoi – in the old quarter, which is not too far, but looks dramatically different from where we stayed last year. Narrow streets, noise, motorscooters, etc. Though our flat has amazing windows and little noise filters through.

After learning that my 3+Year old samsung tablet which runs out of juice in half a day, does not have a replaceable battery, seemed worth looking at replacing it in Melbourne. Turns out the pricing beats Amazon in the US and, with the ability to get the tax refunded at the airport, I ended up with a new Samsung S2 8″ for $267!!! – dualcore, on board memory slot and 32GB. thrilled!!!

Revisit to a place for lunch we went to with Anne Purvis Kathleen Shea Keys and David Keys last year. Lunch includes a beer and desert.

Wandered to the rail station and bought berths on the night train to DsNang. We’ll go onto an airbnb with a pool for $46/nt in Hoi An. Finally, we’ll stay for 2 weeks, tho it took some arm twisting to get someone to really slow down.

Cooler than last year!

9 March

We walked a lot and had some terrific food, but not a lot of photos here. We were here last year!!! We did go in the hotel we stayed at and we chatted with a guide at the airport who was meeting new arrivals for this week’s AmaWaterways cruise like the one we took last year. He knew our cruise manager from last year, Bik, but she wasn’t doing the tour he was on. We went to the botanical gardens and saw a peacock and badminton, which takes over nearly all wide sidewalks and walkways in the afternoon. We spent an afternoon in the War Museum, but cameras weren’t allowed. Soviet and US equipment, tanks, etc, and displays and history going back to the early French occupation in the 1800s. There was also information about the many invasions over the centuries. Seems this place has been subject to more invasions than you can count.

10 March

Last night on Hanoi. In the old quarter at a great restaurant built in the mid1800s for a Frenchman. Charming. And nice outside seating and live piano from just inside. Tasting menu with extra oysters. Yumm!

MAR 11-25, 2018 – Hoi An

March 11, 2018

We start our journey to Hoi An on the overnight train from Hanoi. It’s a 15hr trip departing at 10pm. We sleep poorly on the very hard mattresses but the linens and duvet are very nice. Even with one duvet put underneath as a softener to the mattress, it’s still very uncomfortable. The WC is down the hall and after a short while you have to bring your own TP. A trolley rolled by in the morning with VN coffee and a snack cake. Only later did we learn the rail line company trolley would come by with both a breakfast snack (warm and in a foil tray) and a lunch snack. They both resembled food and didn’t taste too badly. The rice was recognizable! The last several hours of the journey showed great views of the sea and the mountains as we approached DaNang. Views through the window were not all that good, but good enough.

March 13, 2018

Our Airbnb host(ess) has a nail salon. As some may know I’ve never had a mani/pedi….!!! Probably not a big surprise to a few. But: my feet have been in challenging places these last 3 months where I mostly wear sandals and the air is dry and the surfaces are dirt or sand, etc. So I just had my first pedicure!!! salt soak, and an attack by, what I can only call!, a cheese grater to scale off the many layer of dryness, more soaks, and a salt/honey scrub followed by a thick moisturizing cream. Not really wanting to color, I got a “nail treatment” that is just a bit shiny. Nice. $15. I don’t even know what they cost in the US.

March 15, 2018

We’ve settled into our little cottage on the fringes of Hoi An city. We have a general market selling almost everything that’s a 10 min walk from here. There is also a great western deli/market/restaurant/internet cafe where we had lunch today. We’ve also shopped there every day for wine or bread, or milk and today brought home their apple pie and some ice cream! We bought fresh, pick your piece, pork yesterday and Thom braised it with onions, carrots, and garlic until it fell apart. It was awesome, and served with baked potatoes and green beans, couldn’t have been much better.

We generally start slowly in the morning with coffee and cereal of the deli’s homemade muesli, small bananas and greek yogurt. Thom reads and I pay bills, balance accounts, or as in the last few days or so, work on taxes. So glad we’re here a while and there’s still a month to go.

I burned up the plastic microwave rice cooker trying to make popcorn. Weird popcorn so not sure if it’s just something i cant do here. I think I have the translation for rice cooker and will try to replace it tomorrow. The photo isnt too clear as the kernels are 2-3 times larger than our US popcorn.

March 17, 2018

It’s nice just to be in one place for a while. We’ve been here a week now and have more than a week to go. We’ve decided to extend our stay by 2 nights, and on the recommendation from our host Roy, we’ll have Vy, the driver, take us to Hue, and we’ll stay at the Saigon Morin, an early 1900s French style large hotel on the edge of the old city. We’ve booked into a room with a river view for 3 nights. Comes with breakfast each day and a vietnamese set menu dinner. Seeing how we don’t go out very much, and cook in with the good fresh local stuff, this will be nice.

Saturday was another nice slow day, with a late walk into the main part of Hoi An, the old city. We looked around at the market, bought some bananas that were twice the price as in “our” local market, in “our” suburb 10 min away!!! We stopped for a late lunch of beer and a sandwich. We thought we’d go to Paddy’s for dinner and the 6 Nations games, but decided to stay in and watch on the BBC. Couldn’t stay up to watch the Wales match, but turns out Wales won!!! I’ve got the shirt!!!.

March 19, 2018

It’s Monday night here in Hoi An, a slow day, a short walk to get some salt, water, rum, and coffee. It’s Robusta here, not Arabica so it’s really cheap!!! 500g/17oz is about $3US. It’s a harsher flavor, almost like burnt chocolate, but it grows on you very quickly. I think the reason VN coffee is so liked is that when you mix it with sweetened condensed milk it comes up very sweet and chocolaty due to the robusta bean.

Beginning to make plans after our stay 27-30Mar in Hue. We’ll take the overnight train back to Hanoi and go to the airport and fly to Bali. It will be a few days there but the driver for departing will be the ability to redeem points to get out in business class to Europe. working it hard!!! I’m giving up on doing an upgrade as the upgrade costs in points is well over half that needed for an outright award ticket.

We’ll get to Europe on a direct flight from Singapore and then most likely head to Croatia where it is warmer than most of Europe. Then likely to Portugal, Spain, France, Amsterdam, Copenhagen, St Petersburg, and then we’ll see what comes after all that!!!

March 20, 2018

Today was a day of travel planning. The points transfers from both chase and amex came through. No more gambling with upgrades!!! For not much more in points I secured business class on Singapore Air!!! It’s supposed to be one of the best – we’ll get to finally find out. We fly to Bali on 31Mar, and then leave Bali on 3Apr. It’s a short 2+hr trip to Singapore then 12.5hrs to Munich. It’s overnight, and therefore the bus class is finally going to work for us.

We have an apartment in a resort in Bali, nearly on the beach, as there’s a road along the beach that separates much of the area we are in from the hotels. easy walk, though, and 3 pools to play in. And, I just booked into an airbnb flat in Munich that’s only a few blocks from where I stayed 2 years ago. It’s close to the train station where we’ll either catch a train out on 7Apr or take the shuttle to the airport. Thinking the next stop is likely to be Croatia as Europe isn’t quite warm enough for us yet!!!

Twice over the last 2 weeks we went to the food stalls at the Central market after reading about “best pho” as determined by Anthony Bourdain. He wrote up the place we found (by seeing AB’s photo on the sign) and is reported to be an enormous fan of Viet Nam and it’s food. Hoi An’s specialty and found no where else is Cao Lau, a yummy pork bowl that is superb.

March 26, 2018

We are getting ready for our departure tomorrow. It’s been a great 16 days here in Hoi An. Tomorrow we go to Hue for 3 days before leaving Viet Nam.

I’m so glad we stayed here as long as we did. May turn out to be the longest stay of our trip. It was good to have lots of down time and my goal to get all the taxes done – Federal/state and the estate’s. Done today; mission accomplished.

After exploring Hue we depart to Bali for 3 days, actually 2 days, 3 nights. In hindsight I should have made it one day longer and I might have completed the PADI diving course. Some other time!! But with the taxes done, I will enjoy being on the beach or by the pool, and reading….. and then it will be off to Europe. Munich is the stop that got us the ability to use miles to get business class on Singapore Air. We’ll be there a few days to revisit some of the sights I saw in Summer 2016.

MAR 27-29, 2018 – Hue

March 27, 2018

Our airbnb host contacted the driver who picked us up at the train station 2+ weeks ago to take us to Hue, one of the early capital cities of Viet Nam. It was a very scenic drive over the mountains north of Da Nang rather than take the tunnel. At the pass over the top is a strategic spot with ancient structures used in previous wars, including bunkers from the American War. It was a fun pit stop – to climb about and take photos looking north and south from the high point to the switchback we climbed up on, as well as watch a young couple climb on top of a bunker for their wedding photos. Our driver confirmed that the souvenir shops jewelry prices were likely cheaper than what we’d find in Hue city. So I bought rose colored freshwater pearls and stud earrings. $8/$4 respectively!!!

March, 28, 2018

Today was a very long walk!!! We crossed over the bridge and walked through a very large market area and then to the Citadel a large walled area of the original ancient city. Inside is an additionally walled/moated area for the Imperial City. It was here the emperors of the 1800s ruled Viet Nam. Much was destroyed during the wars of 1947 and 1968 and it is slowly being restored. Some areas are clearly green with depressions and broken walls suggesting destruction from the past. After walking though the imperial portion we walked out the “back” side and wandered in the streets of the Citadel. Small streets, shops, houses, cafes, etc. Lots of coffee shops. We eventually got to the west gate out of the Citadel area and headed west to the Thien Mu Pagoda. Hoping to stop for lunch, which we couldn’t find as there were only coffe shops along the road, the walk seemed much longer than the anticipated 35 minutes. Once there all we could do is sit at one of the onsite coffee shops and have a beer and some pringle like snacks. At that point any food was going to do!!!!

The pagoda is up a hill and offers spectacular views. The temple area is small and beautiful and the monks were chanting with an occasional bang on the gong. We walked to the back of the site and spotted a very large cemetery. There was also a very nice bonsai garden and the car driven by The Most Venerable Thich Quang Duc to Saigon on June 11, 1963 prior to his setting himself on fire in protest of discrimination of Buddhists and violating religious freedom. Seeing the car brought back the moment of seeing that photograph in the news.

We took a boat back downtown to our hotel and got off our feet. Even though it was a bit chilly, a swim felt good.

March 29, 2018

Our last day in Hue – Friday is packing up and flying to Hanoi in order to catch Saturday’s flight from Hanoi to Bali. What a time here in Viet Nam – not fast paced like last year. It’s been terrific.

We visited 2 tombs of early and late emperors of Viet Nam when Hue hosted the imperial city/capital of the country. Minh Mang was the second emperor who reigned from 1820-41 and the tomb is 10km from Hue in a quiet wooded area. We walked 45 min to the tomb of Khai Dinh who was the 12th emperor reigning from 1916-1925. The site is noted for its “modern” architecture and building techniques.

It was a nice day – not the same walking as the day before, and we caught a Grab (think Uber) from/to the hotel. Lazy afternoon by the pool. A nice walk into a busy backpacking type area of the city for our last dinner here.

Our time here in SE Asia is drawing to a close. We spent nearly 3 weeks in Thailand and nearly 4 weeks in Vietnam. After 3 days in Bali we will leave the region for Europe to start our explorations there. First stop, a few days in Munich. After that…. TBD.