The 3 of us were up early and flew from Hanoi via Vietair to Da Nang and got a taxi to Hoi An. Hoi An was lovely with a tailor shop for any style desired, a buzzing market with the best food and 3000 Dong Bia Hoi (locally brewed beer without preservatives which means it needs to be sold within 24hours)...what more can one ask from a place?!

A lovely river runs through it and has some French style to be seen in the architecture. Stayed in a more upmarket hotel then we've been used to as we got the Sunflower hotel names mixed up with the hotel Sunshine...wasn't complaining.

Meg and I hired motorbikes and did the Haivan pass (top gear route), what amazing views! We biked from morning to night through fog, rain, sunshine, darkness and peak time traffic in Da Nang...at which point I feared for my life, but would not have done it any other way. Helen made her way up North while Meg and I stayed on.

Reuniting of "old" friends...A turn of events lead Kat and Dai (shall I say a cool British couple), whom I met in in a Hanoi Backpackers, to Hoi An. Meg found this easy rider guy she thought would make a good guide and the next thing we knew the four of us were with 2 guides (Thanh and Chuang) buying us Vietnamese coffee and giving us a business pitch which we accepted and left 2 days later on one of the most memorable road trips...