Hoi An - Vietnam

June 21st - 22nd, 2016

Another UNESCO world cultural heritage site, Hoi-An is an amazing fusion of architectural styles with Chinese, Japanese, Vietnamese and European influences. Its main attractions are the multitude of 200 year old wooden fronted shophouses that make up the centre of the town. It is an utterly charming place, vibrant, busy, colourful, there is a lot to see in a small space and we enjoyed our couple of days here. We could have bought an attractions pass to visit some of the most important sights such as the various Chinese assembly buildings, but they were perfectly visable from the street and we needed to save some money, so instead contented ourselves with looking at some of the other 800 historical buildings preserved here! There is a tiny arched bridge, known as the Japanese Covered Bridge, which you needed a ticket to cross but we had a good nosey from both sides and crossed the stream at a bridge 10m away instead. It used to connect the Japanese and Chinese communities back in the 16th century and is now Hoi-An's emblem. The merchant houses are wonderfully preserved and their dark wooden fronts mix beautifully with the colourful adobe walls and the eclectic mix of items being sold within, we spent a lot of time just wandering around enjoying the atmosphere and trying to stay out of the scorching sun. We found several good places to eat, along the waterfront (Hoi-An is built on the banks of the river Bon) and at the large produce market, where we discovered a local dish called Cao Lau which is delicious, a combination of slow cooked marinated pork, thick noodles, sauce and plenty of fragrant greens. There also seemed to be some kind of festival going on as at night the whole town was alive with vendors, music, street stalls and lights as well as many children out and enjoying what we presume to be the start of the school holidays.