I managed to get away from the 3 storey bunk beds which was good, although the train was way below standard of the comfort class that we got from ho chi minh to Nha trang. Gone was the tv and the fake flowers but instead we had the pleasant smell of damp within our room. After the train set off Harr and I went to look for the dining cart for some additional drinks, it must be said the journey wasn't great to say the least. The cart next to us smelt worse, like trainers after a sweaty work out, then as we progressed through carriage to carriage there was a sense of it can't get any worse. By the time we had reached the last few carriages local people were literally sleeping on, under and around wooden benches. We literally were climbing over people to reach the end of the carriage, i felt a bit of déjà vu from the 90's when I used to attend raves and would have to climb over bodies in the chill out arena to find a space to sit. We reached the dining cart for the security guard to give sign language that there was no beer so we had to turn around and do the same journey back empty handed.

I didn't get much sleep as per usual and was glad when we arrived at Da Nang. The tour guide, V, told us an interesting fact about Da nang, if you catch a beggar and take them to police station you get money for it...similar to recycling bottles but with tramps...cash back.

As soon as we arrived in Hoi An I was straight out shopping, I've been itching to spend some money. Hoi An is really famous for tailor made suits so that's what I went for. Nearly every shop here will make you something from glasses to handbags to clothes. I thought it would be nice to get some clothes that fit me properly. I went for a tailor made black cashmere suit, with 2 pairs of trousers and 4 tailor made shirts, it cost in total 12000000 dong around £340. It seems alot in money but I just wanted to treat myself with some decent smart clothes. What i did notice is they can copy anything here and they bizarrely had Next catalogues so you could show them what you wanted and they would make it similar, obviously copyright laws don't apply in Vietnam. Also did a bit more souvenir buying too, I've accepted that the items won't fit in my backpack and they will have to be posted.

For the first time in weeks i saw rain as we had an electrical storm on Friday night and it hammered it down with rain, it felt nice for a change compared to the rain we get in the uk, plus the storm was cool to watch. I also realised for the first time that it was Easter bank holiday, i completely forgot all about it as they obviously don't celebrate it being a Buddhist country.

Saturday morning I was up on another early start, 6am, for another bike ride into the countryside. I'm getting into this cycling mainly because the land is flat and the scenery is excellent. We cycled through loads of paddy fields and saw quite a few people working within the fields wearing the vietnamese hats (I've been told the name of them but its slipped my mind what they are called), you probably know what they are as they look like a 70s lamp shade placed on top of someone's head. I wanted to get one as a souvenir but I've been told that they are traditional for woman. Which surprised me as I saw a Vietnamese person the other day mixing cement using a spade and thought it must be a bloke but now I'm thinking it could have been a woman. We also saw quite a few buffalo too on the bike ride and someone saw a snake at the side of the road but I didn't see it and I was behind the person who spotted it. The people out in the countryside were very friendly too, which I've found that to be the case on some many different occurrences throughout this trip. The bike ride lasted about an hour and a half and then we returned to the hotel.

I decided to break away from the group as I've wanted some "me" time, as i quite like not being around people continuously, so I headed into the town centre to see some of the highlights on my own. With being on my own I got a few people on mopeds approach me asking me questions, but i walked on quickly so they didn't get the answer. I'm not sure what they wanted but didn't have anything visible to sell, so I'm guessing that it was a bit dodgy. My first impressions of Hoi An is it has a Chinese influence, with Chinese lanterns hanging from buildings and across streets. With the town being quite small its hard not to imagine that you're not in a china town. It was market day so it was really busy in the town, but I had a look to see what was on offer. With it being a food market I was never going to buy anything, but I did see some unusual foods which was as expected. I went into a couple attractions, history museum and a temple and they were all very quick to walk around but the highlight was the assembly hall. It was decorated with Chinese lanterns, had a few stone dragons and the Chinese lettering across doorways. Something that really stood out was this place possibly had the biggest incense sticks I've ever seen. They must have been at least 2m long, all coiled up and burnt from the bottom.

In the afternoon I went back for my suit fitting and it was nearly there with the sizes although it became quite difficult as the place didn't have proper air con so the shirt kept sticking to me , with the heat, making feel like it was tight. That shirt will definitely need a wash before I wear it. Did the silly thing of spending more money in there too, I was going to get a new coat but I didn't have any pictures or designs to show them what I was after, so i went for 2 tailor-made short sleeved casual shirts instead.

In the evening I did a Vietnamese cooking class over the other side of Hoi an town centre. It was good and the food we cooked was rather nice. The Vietnamese woman that was leading the lesson was very friendly and i have to say I've never met anyone with memory like it. There was 15 people from the group that attended and she remembered everyone's name and never made a mistake, which is rather impressive considering english isn't her first language. The only thing that got on my nerves slightly with the evening was she kept singing nursery rhymes and songs from the 80s changing the words to incorporate cooking terms. I know she was trying to make it fun, but i don't need to sing songs with 15 other people to enjoy cooking. I think some of the older people felt even more awkward than i did. We cooked quite a few dishes and ate them after we cooked each dish. The dishes were chicken hot and sour soup, spring rolls, tuna fillet in bananas leave, papaya salad and aubergine clay pot. At the end of the lesson I bought a cookbook from her that had more recipes in it so I'm hoping to try them out when i get home, may even invite one or two to try it. Following in my tradition of drinking soup and eating noodles, I've got quite into a Vietnamese noodle soup called Pho. The recipe book ive bought has a recipe in it so I'm going to making some Pho when I get home.

Sunday morning a bit of lie in as I wasn't going to the My Son temples till 8am. We had to catch a public tour bus which wasn't the best transportation, the leg room was designed for a Vietnamese person so in order for me to get comfortable i had to spread my legs down the isle. Also the air con didn't work, we opened the windows and when the bus was moving it was cooler than the air con working alone. The guide for the My Son tour was called Mr Dung, he was a right character too, when he spoke he had amazing English but his dialect sounded like a badly dubbed kungfu film. The temple ruins were approximately 1 hour drive from Hoi An and i thought they were worth seeing and very similar in design to the temples at Angkor wat but by no means anywhere near as good. The temples had been bombed heavily by the americans during war so they were even more of a ruin than they should have been if they had been left to stand. The evidence of the war could still be seen as as you could see the B52 bomb craters left after the bombs had been dropped. I was a little bit disappointed as there was a lot of people there, most were from our 60 seated public bus, so it made it difficult to get good photos without getting someone else in your shot. We returned to Hoi An and I went for a second suit fitting so I'm hoping it should fit perfectly now. I'm thinking I'm going to post my clothes along with souvenirs as I haven't got the space in my rucksack, it will be interesting to see if they get delivered...probably get lost in Northwich depot

Sunday evening I went for a nice meal as it was a couple on the trip wedding anniversary. It was a really nice meal and i decided to go for a bit of western food as I'm getting sick if rice, so much that I've just been eating everything else but the rice for the last few meals. I had deep fried chicken in some kind of leave that you couldn't eat and barbecue pork spare ribs that had more meat on them than some of the locals. The biggest shock to me of the night was that 2 people on the trip said that I'm like Karl pilkington, which concerned and surprised me all at once. Firstly they were an Australian and a Canadian, I didn't think he had made it internationally, second I've only been with them less than 3 weeks so i didnt think they really knew me, thirdly I've made no reference to Karl pilkington as I didn't think they would know him and fourth I've been good on this trip and being fairly quiet with people, unless they are reading my blog.

After the meal I returned to the hotel to find that my suit and all 6 shirts and spare trousers had been delivered, which was good as I was worried that Penny (very good looking Vietnamese shop assistant) was telling me what i wanted to hear and not what was going to happen. I checked the bags they were delivered in and my handwriting has let me down again, even though I wrote my details in block capitals, they managed to spell my surname completely wrong. They called me Steven Nover, that's a new variant of my surname unless Penny had the wrong type of nova.

We leave for hue tomorrow by private bus which should be good as V is going to tell the driver to take a scenic route along the coast so we get some good photos and also enjoy the spectacular views. Also I'm so glad it's a bus as I can't face another sleeper train so soon after no sleep the last time. I've asked Ray if he could direct me to some tablets in a pharmacist to knock me out, I thought he would be a good person to ask as he is a retired pharmacist. He says he's got some with him that he brought out from home so im going to take them I reckon.

Oh, i found out the other day that one of the older guys on the trip, jim, fought in the Vietnam war in 1969. I'm so keen to ask him loads of questions about the war but I'm ensure if its the right thing to do, I may leave it till the last night in Hanoi. I'm thinking if he's over here then he can't be too effected by it all, it's his second visit too to Vietnam following the war.