We arrived in Hue and headed straight for the Backpackers Hostel after being told that if was the only place worth staying in by someone on the Ha Long Bay trip. The hostel cost us $6 a night each but included an air conditioned dorm, breakfast and free beer from 5-6 every day! We dropped our bags in the room and went for a walk to explore the town, making sure that we were back at the hostel for 4:50. The free drink meant that everybody in the hostel gathered in the bar and got a chance to meet each other so within about 20 minutes we were sat on a table full of strangers exchanging travel stories and recommendations.

We were weighing up the sightseeing options and decided that a tour of the De-Militarised Zone, which included a trip to a war museum and the chance to go down some of the tunnels used by the Vietnamese during the war, would hold our interest a lot more than another temple and pagoda tour so we book the DMZ tour for the next day. 6am start!

The hostel had a happy hour from 8-9 every night as well where cocktails such as the 'passion fruit leg-opener' were buy one get one free. There was an Aussie guy working in the hostel called Chris whose job was simply to get people chatting and keep the guests safe. At 11 o'clock the bar shut and Chris lead a procession of semi-drunk westerners down the street to a bar called Brown Eyes, which was open until the last person leaves. We got back to the hostel at 2 and set our alarms for the early start.

At 6:30 the girl from the reception came and woke us up saying that the bus was waiting for us. We fell out of bed and threw on last nights clothes, had a quick wash and went down stairs. We climbed on the bus (appologetically), got a seat and fell straight to sleep.

The tour was really interesting but was mostly spent on the bus, covering 250 miles of central Vietnam. We arrived back to the hostel at 5:20 and were instantly handed a beer before signing up for the evening's beer pong competition. Happy hangover!

Our plan was to leave for Hoi An the following afternoon but another trip to Brown Eyes, along with our lack of sleep meant that we didn't wake up until 10 minutes before the bus was due to leave! We got some breakfast and checked in for one more night and booked the bus for 8am the following morning before heading to the citadel for some culture. On the way to the citadel we found some old American tanks and big guns so we scrapped the cultural option to get some pictures with more war relics. We got back to the hostel at 6:30, way after the free beer but Chis sorted us out seeing as we had been such good customers. The hostel was really busy but we ended up chatting to two others who were catching the bus the next morning; Lucy, a welsh girl living in London who was on a 3 week holiday and Alex, a lad travelling on his own on a similar route to us.

We managed to get up at 7:30, even fitting in breakfast before catching the bus. Last night's trip to Brown Eyes had taken it's toll on some more than others. As Me and Nathan slept on the bus, Lucy was throwing up out of the door of the bus as we were going along. She tried to blame an upset stomach but the Long Island Iced Teas that she was sinking at 1 in the morning tell another story!

We arrived in Hoi An on Wednesday afternoon and got a taxi to a hotel that had been recommended to us by a girl called Vanessa from the hostel who we are going to meet up with in Oz for Christmas. Lucy checked into a twin room as her friend was arriving the next day and Me, Nath and Alex got a tripple room for $35 - way out of our price range but it was close to town and we had a pool. We spent the rest of the day seeing the town and chilling by the pool and went for some food and a few drinks that night. We were drinking Beer Hoi for 4000 dong (13p) a glass until Alex spotted a bar selling it for 3000! We quickly moved in the interest of saving money. That night we met up with Chris from the hostel in Hue as he had to go to the doctors and was staying over for the night.

Thursday morning we woke up and got straight into the pool before checking out of the hotel as it was too expensive. We ended up about 40 metres away in the sister hotel where we got a room for 3 for $20 and still had full use of the pool. Once in our new hotel we decided to have a lie down for 5 minutes. We put the tv on and Ghostbusters was just starting. 2 hours later we left the room. We had booked to go and see the My Son ruins on Friday morning and so as not to make the same mistakes as in Hue we were in bed at 11.

The ruins were about an hour away from our hotel and we spent a couple of hours looking around them. It was absolutely boiling so we decided to go to the beach when we got back to town after Alex got fitted for a suit and Nathan had to get some flip flops made - they don't cater for size 12 feet in Vietnam.

Friday night was Alex's last night before heading back to Hue for a few more days there, so we met up with some more people from the hostel and went out for dinner. The bars in Hoi An all close at midnight so we get a free bus to a beach party that was on til 4. The bar holding the beach party was about 100 metres from the beach and almost empty so we called it a night and went home.

At 8:30 on yesterday morning there was a knock on our door and it was Michael who had just arrived off the night bus from Nha Trang. We were still pretty tired so he dumped his bag and went for a long breakfast while we got another hour in. We finally got up and went for breakfast and to show Michael around the town. He got measured for a suit to send home and was very nearly ripped off by the overly flirty female taylor, who cut her price from 3.2 million dong to 1.5 million within 1 minute of bartering! Bloody Pikeys!

Last night we went to eat at Cafe 43 which had been recommended to us by Lauren and Paula from the slow boat. The food was excellent. I had fish grilled in banana leaves and Nath had stuffed squid. Michael was feeling a bit dodgy so just had chicken fried rice (girl). We headed off into town and met up with all the people we had seen over the past few nights and decided to give the beach party another go. This time it was much better, there were more people sat at our table than were in the entire bar the night before! We finally got in at 5 this morning to eat the sandwiches which we had bought earlier in the night and put in the fridge for when we got in drunk - One of the best ideas that Nath has ever had!

We checked out this morning and nursed our hangovers by the pool. We had a quick walk around the town and went for dinner before saying our goodbyes to Michael.

I am now sat on the 12 hour night bus to Nha Trang. It's a sleeper bus with 'beds' as wide as half a normal bus seat and barely long enough for me. Nath must be loving it!