Cham Island snorkeling

At this point in time, Auntie Alex had joined us and we booked a day trip to the Cham Islands group about an hour of the shore for some snorkelling. This meant an early start at 7:45. to be picked and taken to the local port.

The trip comprised of two locations around the smaller islands which were more like rocky outcrops.

I wasn't expecting much as I had been on the great barrier reef diving.

Surprise surprise the water was really clear and the coral was up close and quite varied. There weren't many big fish but plenty of different smaller ones and quite a few various corals hard and soft. we had up to an hour in each location.

We purchased our tickets with Cham Island Diving and cost about $55 per person

We then headed to the big island and Bai Chong beach which is very nice for lunch which included squid, chips, pork chops, noodle and rice etc.

This was followed by r and r time on the beach with plenty of hammocks and sun beds.

Harry took the opportunity to impale himself on a bit of wire or nail.

Free bike ride with a special reward

Hired out the Hotels free bikes a little old but did the job no gears but 

easy to ride when on flat ground.

We headed north from the hotel and into the local paddy fields as far as we could go without getting lost, too hot or run over.

We had a brief refreshment stop at the front of someone's house in Cam Ha and continued on in an anti-clockwise direction back to the river Hue Bon River via the front of the 

Chùa Long Tuyền Buddhist temple

Back in town, Nicola told us to look for a bakery type shop for coffee and cake.

We spied some cake in a window.

We had stopped in Mrs Vy's Kitchen and Deli a rather nicely decorated smallish restaurant and coffee shop or so we thought until venturing down the back for a toilet stop.

This place turns out to be a rather large establishment, restaurants on three floors and a cooking school.

After we head back for our first daylight look at the old city.

The old town is very picturesque but also very busy with tourists it is great for walking around in the evening. The sad thing is that most of the shops are selling the same old things as you would have seen in other parts of South East Asia. It would help if they were a bit more creative with their artwork and souvenirs sadly nothing comes close to the variety of Bali.

More nighttime lantern shots

An Bang Beach and the Old Town

We decided on a few hours at the beach with the use of the shuttle bus which because of the odd times ended up being about 4 to 5 hrs. 

An Bang beach has been used over the past year instead of the closer Cua Dai beach due to a cyclone that removed most of the sand about a year ago. All of the larger hotel shuttle buses drop off at their various affiliated beach bars and restaurants and everybody is crammed in together.

Not much to do here and the parasailing guys were making a fortune never stopping. Cost 600,000VND for 1 person and 800,000 for 2 each flight barely lasting 5 minutes. they would have made about 6 to 8 million an hour that's at least $400.

Luckily beer was about $1.50

The beach, in general, was fairly clean and the sea clear and warmish.

I did not appear to suffer from plastic particles like the beaches around Phuket etc

The water tends to get choppier as the day progresses.

Lunch was a short stroll inland away from the rather expensive fish restaurants right on the water.

After some experimentation and research back in the room with camera exposures etc we head back into town to take in the sights and dinner.

Hoi An

We arrived at our hotel for our ten-night stay which is kind of met with some people "OH Ok that long" It seems that most people are doing a tour of Vietnam with usually only a two or three night stay then back on the bus.
We stayed at the Lotus Hoi An Boutique Hotel and Spa we had chosen it for its reviews and location is not too far from the centre of town and again not too far from the beach. It ended up being a bit too far from both and made good use of the shuttle bus which goes at odd times. It is, however, good if you use the free bicycles.

View from our balcony

After resting up a dip in the pool we headed out to find somewhere to eat as it was now getting dark.

We knew that we weren't going to be in town for the full moon lantern festival but that appeared not to matter as every night is lantern festival night.

We headed for the cloth market area and found most stalls closing up or closed we were directed off by a local in another direction and found we were heading for the river area and literally turned a corner to be met by dozens of boats, buildings and stalls all lit up by every kind of lantern you could think of.

Typical Lanterns in the Old City

We kinda didn't head into town for the full-on walk-around tour. So we headed back to the market are to find some food and we end up at a hawker stall just inside the cloth market which does just about everything, not just cloth.