Sorry everyone, I know it's been a while but we're all safe and well. I last left off with the overnight bus to Hoi An and we arrived bright and early at our hostel where the owners were very friendly. Unfortunately there were renovations being done which meant it was noisy and the rooftop area was closed. However, there was a sister hostel run by the same people that was way more attractive and activities were shared between the two which meant we met lots of cool people. I forget which day we did what so I'm just gonna describe all the activities we did over the 3 days.

So the first night we went on a street food tour led by a guy who worked in the hostels. He took us to a few vendors where we tried; BBQ pork & lemongrass sticks; Ban Bao which was kind of a tiny portion of gloopy rice with a shrimp sauce on top with fried crispy noodles; Ban Can which was a dish of omelette cups with noodles, beef, salad and lettuce in a tasty sauce; for the more adventurous (which didn't include us) there was a delicacy which consisted of a chicken embryo egg; cao lao which was pork, noodles & salad in a nice sauce; and lastly for desert we tried a sweet corn pudding topped with coconut milk. Some were nicer than others, but overall it was a good experience forcing us to try local dishes that we'd otherwise have dismissed. After that we all stayed out for drinks and games. It was a great night getting to know new people.

We finally got some sun so we hired bicycles and cycled 6km to An Bang beach with two of the guys we met on the street food tour; Tim (from Holland) and Ron (from Israel). Ron even brought his ukulele so we had live music while we soaked up the sun. The two other evenings we had there were spent walking around the old town enjoying the colourful lantern-filled streets and shopping in the markets, enjoying some people watching, food and a drink or two in various places.

We spent quite a bit of time in the old quarter as we all had some clothing custom made by some adorable Vietnamese women in the market as this was apparently a 'must-do'. We chose the style & fabrics of clothing we liked and then were measured all over ready for the tailors to commence work straight away. They make them so quick and so well, we were very impressed!! We also took in some culture by visiting some of the historic buildings such as assembly halls, the Japanese bridge and a famous Vietnamese family's chapel.

On our final day we had to catch another night bus at 6:15pm to our next destination where we're spending Christmas... Nha Trang.