This morning we had free time so I headed back into Hoi An central to try to track down the elusive candle holders I wanted. I'd seen a couple of shops last night that showed potential, but unfortunately they couldn't come up with the green ones I wanted. Although they didn't have the style I wanted on their shelves a couple of the shopkeepers knew the ones I was after so said "Wait a minute, I get them for you." Sadly they both could only get red ones and it too...

We arrived in Da Nang last night then drove to Hoi An, home of Hoi An Express, our tour company. My first impression was that it was a lot more spacious and less crazy on the road...not near as much horn tooting. As we drove past huge tourist resorts, I decided that maybe all of Hoi An wasn't like this...and I was right. It wasn't long before we were back amongst the traditional style Vietnamese homes. Our new residence for the next three nights, River Beach R...

Today was a very confronting day as we heard the Vietnamese side of the war. I'd always understood that we (the USA and Australia) were the "good guys" in the war and North Vietnam were the "bad guys". I guess they really were as they invaded South Vietnam, but our guide Loi, who is from South Vietnam, often referred to America as "the enemy". Our first stop was the Cu Chi (pronounced Gucci) Tunnels. The tunnels are a system of underground tunnels originally b...

What an incredible start to the tour. This morning I met the Hoi An Express tour guide Loi and the other guests from the Vissai Hotel doing the tour. I was expecting to be part of a very international group (two Americans, two Brits, three Germans, a Belgian and myself) but found out that they were just arriving on the same flight from Singapore as me and we all needed to get landing visas upon arrival to Vietnam. Our tour is made up of two girls in their late...

I still can't get over the scooters, so this blog will mainly be about them, then I'll try not mention them again. They're like a school of fish, moving as one, parting to go around pedestrians, cars and other scooters, then reforming. Although the traffic looks chaotic, I've come to realise it's an organised chaos and the drivers are very skilled and considerate of each other. Some of the interesting things I saw strapped on to scooters today were a front sin...