I'm giving this little town the unofficial title of 'best place to take Instagram pictures'. It is truly stunning, I am so glad I changed my plans so I could fit this town in before I go back to Cambodia. Not only that, but I actually ended up visiting during the full moon celebration!
This town is full of picturesque lanterns and cute coffee shops. The city is influenced by a fusion of cultures; Chinese, Japanese and French. It's a UNESCO World Heritage Site which means lots of old buildings are protected, making the streets look beautiful with old wooden houses dotted around the place. During the day, people wonder around 'window' shopping the street stalls, there are also apparently a ratio of 2:1 tailor shops to other shops which means that getting tailor made clothes is a popular thing to do in Hoi An. I got some tailor made clothes; a dress for a wedding I'm going to in October, a pinafore dress and some trousers.
***A tip that I would give is that it's worth shopping around at different tailors before purchasing, I just went with a tailor that was recommended to me by my Airbnb host, but after wondering around I kinda wished that I would have shopped around a bit more. But my clothes are still lovely.***
There was also a market that I walked through. There were so many interesting faces selling everything from meat to plastic toy cars. I loved photographing the women preparing vegetables and weighing out fish, although it proved quite difficult to capture their faces under their Vietnamese hats.
When the sun goes down the floating lanterns come out! I was super shocked when I walked to the river after my dinner to find hundreds of people walking across the bridge, floating in boats on the river, and sellers selling lanterns and other paper based products on the banks. It was chaos and it took me by surprise because it wasn't nearly as busy in the day. The town came alive at night! I was immediately surround by people asking me if I wanted to go on a boat and place a lantern in the water. I had no idea what price I should of payed, I got an offer of 200,00VND to start with and I managed to get a boat ride for 100,000VND (which is around £3.30). Even that was very over priced but I was in Hoi An during the full moon so I thought I had to place a lantern on the river. All of the shops turned off their lanterns so it became really dark, the only light source came from the full moon and the flashes of people taking pictures. It was beautiful, my photos really don't do it justice.
The streets also turn into entertainment stages with singers singing traditional Vietnamese songs and games being payed. There was this one game that involved someone hitting a clay pot whilst being blind folded. It was funny to watch people stumble around and hit nothing but air. Younger children also dressed up as dragons and played drums whilst parading around the streets. It was very cute to see them perform and it reminded me of what people do in Chinese festivals.
To finish off my time in Hoi An, I took a motorbike trip through Hai Van Pass. Top Gear did it during their Vietnam special. It was so much fun to be winding round sharp corners in the open air. There were of course beautiful views as well. It took me the whole day, we went right up near Hue and then back to Hoi An.
At the moment I am waiting at Da Nang airport for my flight which doesn't leave for another 4 hours! Wish me luck.
Commentaires