As I am leaving Hoi An today, I booked a trip out to My Son temple ruins knowing that I would be back in time for my bus down south to Nha Trang. The ruins of My Son temples are set within the jungle 35km from Hoi An and are the most important remains of the ancient Cham empire and it is now a Unesco World Heritage site. There were several options when booking the tickets to go here, but I opted for the trip to My Son by coach which included the boat trip back from the temples as this would get me back to the hotel with no too much time to waste before catching the night bus later.

And for today's lesson.....

Mỹ Sơn is a cluster of abandoned and partially ruined Hindu temples constructed between the 4th and the 14th century A.D. by the kings of Champa (Chiêm Thành in Vietnamese). The temples are dedicated to the worship of the god Shiva as he is known under various local names, the most important of which is "Bhadresvara."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/My_Son

It was an 08:30 start this morning being met by the bus at my hotel and we arrived at My Son temple at around 09:30. We spent a couple of hours walking around the different temple sites, many of which had been bombed heavily during the Vietnam war by the Americans, so those temples still standing were this way because of them being left derelict for hundreds of years. There were still many bomb holes visible around the temples and surrounding areas. After wandering around in the heat we headed back to the bus where we were taken to the river to get on a boat.

On the way back the boat stopped at a small village where they had many wood work companies making crafts and gifts and also a boat builder. We had a walk around and although we were not pressurised into buying anything, I bought a small wooden carving of a traditional Vietnamese woman as my one souvenir of Vietnam.

We then got taken back to Hoi An and dropped off at the harbour. On the walk back to the hotel I took a few pictures of the town as I walked through.

At around 19:30 the overnight bus to Nha Trang came to pick me up and to my surprise Boris and Maude were also booked on the same bus again with me although they had told me they were staying longer but must have changed their plans. We boarded the bus and we saw the worst thing that you could wish for on a 12 hour overnight bus journey.....yes, a sign written on the toilet door saying "SORRY TOILET IS RROKEN" which we assumed meant the toilet was Broken!!

When we stopped for dinner I was very surprised to see that the coach driver had joss sticks stuck in his number plate “for luck”, I guess we could all do with some good luck. Especially if you went into the toilet block. This must have been one of the smelliest toilets I have been in, and trust me, I have been in many smelly toilets on my trip so far!