Mortal Coil

My last trip report had us heading north up the coast for a bit of seaside relaxation. After this, we cheated a little bit and hopped on a plane up to Hội An, a ridiculously charming (and deservedly touristic) French colonial town about halfway up the coast towards Hanoi.

We had approached Hoi An with caution due to its reputation as a tourist trap, but we were in luck as it was Reunification Day holiday weekeend, which meant that the sheer numbers of Vietnamese tourists meant that we didn’t feel like Hội An was some sort of theme park for Western tourists. We had a blast in our three days there, and managed to hook up with some friends who were heading in the other direction.

Hội An is a small town, easily walkable, with a charmingly down-at-heel look about it (my folks would have called it “elegantly shabby”). It was generally a friendly town, with a great deal going for it on the food scene, and a lot of history to trawl through. There was also a great central food market. We had day trips out to the Cham temple ruins in My Son as well as some very scenic beaches and outlying villages surrounded by rice paddies.

As it happened I found Hội An extremely photogenic and came away with over 700 photos of the place. Clearly I will not be subjecting anyone to the full 700, but I still uploaded a bulging set of 50 of my favourite Hội An shots to Flickr. I present a selection of my favourites below but I highly recommend a browse of the other photos over on Flickr.

Next time around: The imperial city of Hue. Then onwards to Hanoi, Sapa and Ha Long Bay…