Vietnam: A Day Trip to My Son Ruins

One interesting thing about a lot of the local people that we interacted with was their blunt and this-is-the-way-it-is attitude. We experienced this when we decided to go to My Son Ruins. We had done a little research and learned that there isn't much shade there and to beat the sun and crowds, it is recommended to go right when it opens at 8:00. We told the front desk that we wanted to go to My Son and if they could arrange a driver. They tell us that the driver would be here at 10:00 the next morning. It takes about an hour and half to get there, so we told them that we would like to leave at 7:00. That lady at the front desk then proceeds to tell us what we have to do, and we have to go at 10:00. We have a little discussion with her, then finally we all just tell her that we need the car at 7:00 and walk away.

This same thing happened the night before at dinner. I had ordered a dish that desperately needed salt, and Holly had ordered french fries that needed salt, so we ask for salt. The waitress then said no and tells us that we don’t need salt and then brings a weird red sauce over and said this is what you need. No, we need salt, but she wouldn’t hear of it.

This same type of situation happened over and over multiple times, sometimes they won the conversation and rarely did we win the conversation, but My Son Ruins was one we won and the next morning we were ready at 7:00 and the driver was there to pick us up.

We arrived at My Son and there wasn’t a soul in site. We bought our tickets and a shuttle was waiting for us right there to take us to the Ruins. We started down the path at the end.  We didn’t know this until we were done, but we started at the Exit and went through the Ruins backwards. I’m actually super glad we did because the main temples were the last thing we saw, so we saved the best for last, but if we had gone the other way we wouldn’t have appreciated cluster K and spent so much time enjoying it. There wasn’t anyone there, so we were able to take our time and walk around and take pictures before moving on.

We came to the larger Cluster E, where a lot of the temples are crumbling or already a pile of ruble. There was one in the far right that was still intact and we walked around and in it. A lot of the Ruins here reminded me of the Ruins of Cambodia.

These Ruins in Vietnam are clusters of abandoned and ruined Hindu temples. The statue of the god Shiva could be found through the Ruins.

We didn’t want to walk up stairs, so we passed Group G and went across a bridge towards Group C and B where the main intact temples lie. The bridge was surrounded by so many trees and connected the two clusters of temples. It almost looked like they were two cities attached by a road.

The temples in this area were very much like the temples and Ruins I saw in Cambodia. The temples had that raw natural look to them, and looked as if they were one with their surroundings. We took about an hour in this area admiring the buildings and the architecture.

We were able to walk in a few of the temples, but not very many. Since the Ruins were abandoned for a while, a lot of the temples collapsed in on themselves. The main temple had moss and seedlings growing all over it and I just thought it was so gorgeous. There were beautiful sculptures and statues all around the area too.

The sun was up and it was beginning to get hot, so we decided to call it a day and head back to the car. We got back in a shuttle and made our way to the front of My Son Ruins. We had to walk further this time since there were many people, and the shuttles were constantly being used, but we didn’t mind because we were able to walk across an elaborate bridge that we missed coming into the Ruins. I enjoyed My Son and enjoyed walking around the beautiful grounds and seeing all the ancient temples. It’s pretty crazy how similar it was to Cambodia, yet so far from it. But the raw beauty can be seen in both places.

Vietnam: Biking through Hoi An

Since our villa offered free bikes, Heather, Corianne and I took advantage of the free bikes as we rode around Hoi An. Holly had scheduled a country-side motorbike tour, so while Holly was off seeing the countryside, we went on our own countryside adventure. After grabbing the bikes, we decided to get a few pictures and ask if the villa had any Vietnamese hats we could use, they provide us with four hats. We were excited to look the part on a bike in Vietnam.

One of the cool things about the triangle Vietnam hats is that it is not just a souvenir that tourist buy, but the people really truly wear these hats. All over town, in the fields, people on bikes and old women standing by the road were keeping themselves protected from the sun and heat by wearing the triangle hats. I was expecting the hats to be heavy and awkward, but on the contrary, they were so light you almost didn’t feel them, and they were quite comfortable too, and let’s not forget how cute they look.

We asked the front desk if they had any recommendations for locations to cycle, and a few minutes later a man jumps on a motorcycle and we are informed to follow him.

Corianne wasn’t feeling well, and so we originally planned for a slow, leisure ride through rice fields and seeing a little bit of Vietnam in the rough. Instead, we find ourselves trying to keep up with the motorcycle not exactly sure where he is leading us. As we ride, another motorcycle comes up to our leader and they talk for a while, then the other motorcycle slows down and starts riding right next to Corianne. They talk a while and then the lady continues to trail us. About a half an hour later, we find ourselves stopped at a tourist trap. It’s the river village and to even walk in the village you have to pay money. The women on the motorcycle starts trying to sell us on a basket boat ride in her family’s boat. We just want to see the river and the boats, but they won’t let us in unless we pay the fee. We try to explain we just want to see so we can decide if we want to stay, but they will not let us pass. Corianne, Heather and I talk privately and laugh about riding all this way for a tourist trap, and decide to ditch our motorcycle self proclaimed guide and just ride around the fields we passed. We tell them we will come back later, so they would leave us alone.  There was a huge golden dragon at the entrance, so we snap some pictures then go back the way we came.

As we are riding, now at our intended slow and leisure pace, I notice that all along the road are tarps with brown stuff laid out on top of it.  At first I am not sure what I am looking at, until it clicks and I realize this is rice on the side of that road.  I heard once while growing up that rice is just laid on the road to dry, and I laughed at the though thinking how gross that would be.  But here I am seeing first hand tarp after tarp with rice laid right on the road.  In some spots, the rice was literally in the middle of a main road with the cars swerving around the tarps.  It was neat to see something I heard as a child actually be true.  

As we are riding back towards the rice fields I notice a small alley road where a large group of people are walking in and out. We stop, turn around and decide to try our luck down the mysterious ally. We find ourselves on a small dirt road following the river. The small path has so many fun and beautiful surprises. We find a small alcove that had a cute boat and a bunch of ducks.

We find ourselves enjoying the ride even more and we slow down and start to really take in the beauty of Vietnam. We aren’t met by many people, which leave us to enjoy the ride at our pace. We find some amazingly cute Vietnamese homes and buildings. The breeze from the river is perfect and there are so many trees that we are pretty cool and in the shade for most of our ride.

We ride the dirt river road for a while, until we make our way back to the main road, where we cross the street to ride down the rice fields.

There weren’t a ton of rice fields in this area, but with Cori sick and the dumb long ride to the tourist trap, we were pretty much spent. We did enjoy seeing some locals working in the rice. I was hoping to see water Buffalo up close in the rice fields working away, but it just wasn’t meant to be. We were close to the villa now, so we road back to the villa.  I’m so glad we found the dirt road, and were able to just enjoy our ride through Hoi An’s country via a river dirt road and a river field. Vietnam is so beautiful and breathtaking with all the green and flowers.

Vietnam: Beautiful Old Town Hoi An and An Bang Beach

Old Town Hoi An has such charm. I was captivated by the ancient French colonial yellow buildings everywhere and the abundance of flowers and trees. We came to Hoi An at the perfect time because the trees and flowers were in full bloom. I don’t know if they are always in full bloom or not, but it was gorgeous.

On our first day, we decided to walk around Old Town Hoi An and do a little exploring and site seeing. One of the first buildings we saw was directly across from the clothes district and was bright yellow throughout. It seemed to be a city hall, and was used as a landmark for us during the rest of our stay here.

We started at the City Hall, which I will call it, and just started walking the streets. We didn’t get very far before we walked past an old temple with a huge green gate with beautiful green shutter windows. I marveled at the windows, lanterns and the paintings.

After walking around Old Town for a while, we called a Taxi to check out An Bang Beach. We knew we wanted to go to the beach today, so we all had our suits on. We got to the beach and were overwhelmed by the rows and rows of umbrellas.

I did read somewhere before coming here that if you just walk to the end, you can sit in the beach chairs free, as long as you purchase something from the restaurant associated with the chairs. At the front of the beach, they charged to use the chair then charged more for food, so we walked a little ways down the beach and past the crowds and found the free chairs with food or drink purchase. I bought an ice cream and sat down.

The beach has beautiful white sands and pretty clear waters. There are so many people that it’s hard to really see the beauty of the beach beyond them. We sit and watch the crazy paraglider. These crazy people pay a boat to lift them straight off the beach. We watched quite a few failed attempts, some that made me cringe and know that someone got hurt. One time the boat stopped and the person plummeted into the water with the parachute and all. They were in the water for a while before the boat pulled them through the water until the parachute caught the wind and took them out of harms way. Why anyone would pay for sand in the mouth and skid marks from the water, is beyond me.

We stayed at the beach a few hours until the sun set below the horizon. I’m not a get-in-the-water type of gal, but I did love walking along the beach, feeling the heat from the sun on my skin and relaxing in the beach chair not having to worry about constantly watching kids for fear of them drowning. It was glorious. We ended up eating dinner at a beach side restaurant before calling it a day.

Let’s return to Old Town again. While exploring Old Town another day, we visited the old Japanese Bridge. I was expecting something a little bigger and grandeur, so was a little disappointed when all I saw was a small Asian bridge over a small river. We had to pay money to cross the bridge, and I was thinking something amazing would be on the other side or inside the bridge, but all I found were normal shops on the other side with normal people shopping. Inside the bridge was a small worship room, where incense we’re being burned, it wasn’t anything that wowed me, so I walked away wondering why the hype of this bridge.

We continued walking in old town and found more and more shops. This is where we found the leather shop that made our purses and shoes. We also saw more of the beautifully old yellow buildings.  

We found ourselves walking along the river, which was super cool. There were boats in the water on both sides of the river with men shouting out trying to get tourists to pay for a ride down the river. There were also men on little tut tut bikes calling out for tourist to rest their weary feet and take a ride. We never took a boat ride or a tut tut ride, but it was fun watching others do so.

We went back to Old Town a few more times and one of my favorite experiences during the entire trip took place in Old Town at an old house with a sign saying ‘Visitors welcome, free tour’. It was hot and the inside of the house was calling to us, it was beautiful, ancient and had red lanterns covering the entry way. As we stood staring in, but not brave enough to walk in, a kind women comes out and in perfect English tells us to come it.

We are welcomed by a super kind women who then starts walking us around her home. She explains that the home is owned by her and her family and is one of the oldest houses in the area. The family still lives in the home, but they open it to the public. We walked around the beautiful home, and are shown amazingly old antiques owns by the woman’s grandparents.

The family is generations old silversmiths and still own the tools owned by their grandparents. We were shown cabinets and dressers that were hundreds of years old. As we were walking around the house this super happy and funny man comes and turns on a portable A/C unit and starts following us around our tour of his house making sure we were nice and cool. He had such a contagious laugh.

We are brought to one of the last rooms which hold the ancient silversmith tools. We find out the A/C man is the owner and husband to the nice lady and also a silversmith. He then shows us how to use each of the tools. He would hold one up, and say “What is this?”, and we would all take guesses as he laughs his cute contagious laugh. He would then show us how to use the tool and demonstrate its use.

He then offered to clean all our jewelry for free while we walked around the last room, which held the silver jewelry that he and his family made. Boy did they pick the right girls for this! I think they saw the sparkle in our eyes as we took in the earrings and rings and necklaces; hook, line and sinker.

We spent the next hour or so draining our bank accounts on jewelry. One thing I really wanted to get while here was sterling silver earnings, and we had hit the motherload. The wife was the one who designed the earrings, rings and pendants and her husband made them. The designs were so pretty. I was wearing my earrings that I bought in Thailand at the Silver Temple, and she liked them so much she took a sketch and picture of them to make a new earring design for their shop.

After talking with them for a while, and buying lots and lots of jewelry, the wife asks if we have eaten a particular noodle dish that is only found in Hoi An. She then orders the meal to be delivered and sits us at their kitchen table and feeds us dinner. We talk about their shop, the food, our families as if we are old friends. Holly and Heather both served missions and they shared a bowl and ate every last drop. They were telling Cori and I that this is how the people serve and show their love, and they will get offended if we don't eat it all. Cori and I do the best we can, and I eat until I feel like I am going to pop, but in the end there was still 1/4 of the bowl left. Sure enough when the wife came back she made a comment about us not eating it all, lol.

We ended up spending a good part of our day here, but it was time well spent. It was wonderful to spend half a day with strangers who became friends.

Vietnam: Hoi An’s Never Ending Shopping

Hoi An has the most and best shopping from any other trip I have ever been on. The biggest attraction of Hoi An is the shopping, but not just any shopping, it’s custom shopping. They have a clothes district and a shoe district and a leather district. In a matter of 24 hours you can have dresses, shirts, ties, purses, shoes, you name it, made to fit perfect in the color or design of your choice.

The first thing we did was head over to the clothes district to have some clothes made. We wanted to make sure there was enough time to get measured and then fit before we left. When we got to the clothes district, we were immediately seized upon by the shop owner piranhas. I felt like a large piece of meat that was being fought over. We were followed and pretty much told where and what we had to do. We needed to exchange money, so one lady took us to someone who could exchange money, then she sat and waited for us to change our money.

I had done my research before coming and had already picked out someone that I wanted to make my clothes, Sewing Bee. While Heather, Holly and Cori got swept into the first tent, I walked around looking for Sewing Bee. I found her easy enough and then she and I went about choosing material and a design for some dresses and shirts I wanted made. I brought my absolute favorite Micheal Kohls shirt with me and had her copy the exact design for three new shirts. I also had three tunics made and two dresses. Holly and Corianne also had dresses made, and Heather got some dresses made for her girls.

After getting everything situated with our custom clothes, we found ourselves being swept into the shoe district. The sister of the piranha then grabbed the other girls swooped in and brought us to her shoe shop. Corianne had some super cute shoes made there. It was neat seeing all the designs and color possibilities. I remembered that Big Sis needs some church shoes, so I took pictures and tried to figure out how to get her some shoes. It took a day to get Cori’s shoes back, and I was just in love. We ended up stopping at another leather shoe place where I got two sandals made for me and some church sandals made for Big Sis. It was really neat watching them work. They trace your foot, then take measurements of your foot in three different places, around your big toe, around your ankle. I called Big Sis on FaceTime and we did the measurements over the phone while the lady wrote down the measurements. After measurements we then got to pick the leather color. There were about a million choices. I ended up getting one black sandal and one red sandal made. Big Sis chose this gorgeous silver-ish gold color leather. Holly also got some shoes and boots made, and we all love love love our shoes!

I wasn’t planning on getting a purse, but while in the leather shop, Holly found this adorable purse, and got it. Then Heather had a purse made for her mom and then a super cute turquoise made for her. I found a purse design that I just fell in love with and had them make it in the same red leather as my sandals. Red is my most favorite color, and let me tell you what, the red sandals and the red purse make me very happy.

But the shopping didn’t end there, every single day we found ourselves shopping and shopping some more. We would pick up the clothes we had made, then decide to have something else made while there. I ended up getting some ties made for Kevin and Little Monster. Holly and Cori had dresses made for their girls after seeing the dresses Heather picked up for her girls. Each time we went back. We saw the cutest things.

One of my favorite places to go was the night market. The night market was a crazy crowded pedestrian street filled with vendors with souvenirs, trinkets, street food and Hoi An lanterns all lit up. I loved the lanterns. So Much! Lanterns were hung from every building and every store. Every restaurant had a string of lanterns out in front of their store with the store name painted on each lantern. Ever single lantern was lit up filling the streets with vibrant bright colors. It was gorgeous.

I just couldn’t get enough of the lanterns. We found out that we could do a lantern making class, so we excitedly made an appointment and made our very own lanterns. Poor Corianne was feeling super awful sick (come to find out after we got home that she had a bad case of strep throat the entire time, and was an amazing trouper) so she ended up going back to the villas during the lantern making class. We felt so bad that she missed it.

We found Phuoc Dong Handicrafts and were able to make our lanterns sitting at a small table with tiny chairs on the side of the shop. We were given the bamboo skeleton of the lantern and learned that the shop keeper has been doing this her entire life and her family has been lantern makers for generations. Her father and husband are the ones who had make the skeletons.

After picking out our shape and size, we then got to pick our fabric. We all choose different solid silk fabrics. The fabric is then glued to the skeleton in small sections using what smelled just like rubber cement. I was taken back to my schools days by the smell of the glue and we all reminisced about rubber cement and peeling it off our hands.

The sections has to be pulled super tight to fit just right on the skeleton bamboo, and the shop keeper made sure they were all perfect.

Once the lanterns were done, we were able to pick the color of strings and bead that hung from the bottom. I ended up doing a silver lantern with black string and a black bead. When we were all done we got pictures with our beautiful hand made lanterns and the shop keeper. It took about an hour and a half to make the lanterns from start to finish. The work involved in making these lanterns made me appreciate their beauty even more.

So back to the Night Market! These amazing lanterns were everywhere in the night market and I was in love. I kept buying lanterns, and going back and buying more. They were about $3.00-$6.00 a lantern depending on the size and material. Holly, Cori and Heather couldn’t believe it when I kept going back to the lantern shops and returning with another lantern. They kept teasing that I wouldn’t be able to fit them in my luggage with all the other shopping we did. I didn’t mind, because I knew I would never find anything like these lanterns anywhere in the world but here.

We continued walking around the Night Market and had some amazing street food. They had these Nutella Banana Rotis, Paper Pizza, and ice cream rolls that were simple delicious. I just couldn’t get enough of the Rotis. It was like a crepe filled with bananas and Nutella, except it tastes more like waffle batter, and much more greasy. They were super flat and just delicious.

The street food had crazy stuff like fried frogs, octopus, lobsters and crazy seafood on a stick. It was fun to see it all lined on the street. It was bonus if we saw someone buy one and eat it.

Another “shopping” thing we did almost everyday was find a massage place and get feet massages. There were ladies everywhere trying to get clients for massages, and we took full advantage of that. We got massages pretty much every day. The best part was that it cost less then $8.00 for an hour foot massage. It was heavenly! They would do this crazy toe popping thing that felt so weird. After walking all day, it was definitely something we got very spoiled in doing, and it was so nice to get a massage for so cheap, but done so well.

I almost forgot about the fruit! Oh the glorious and mouth watering fruit! Delicious and crazy good fruit was everywhere. One of the first things we did on the first day was stop at a fruit stand and buy fruit, all kinds of fruit to taste and try, some we hadn’t ever seen before. But everyone’s favorite was the mangos. We had the store keeper cut them right there, and just ate them as we walked. They were so good I was licking the inside of the peel to get every last drop. I couldn’t get enough of the mangos or the pineapple, it was picked to perfection and each one tasted tantalizing. Oh blessed fruit, how I miss you in Korea!