Hi Everyone,

We have been very busy since we last wrote! In Ho Chi Mihn City we did a few more things like going on a half-day trip to see the Cu Chi Tunnels (which was interesting but a bit hokey and we had a very obnoxious tour guide!), going to the War Remnants Museum, and some relaxing! Then we took a quick flight to Danang on the morning of April 22nd, followed by a 45 min taxi ride to Hoi An, which is where we are now.

Hoi An is a gorgeous town, set right along a river. It has a lot of European influences and is a nice change from the loud cities! The scenery is beautiful and the small streets are fun to walk around and check things out. The day we arrived we just spent walking around the town and exploring a bit. We decided to make dinner ourselves to take a break from restaurants, and we had a lot of fun going to the market and haggling over sandwich ingredients and vegetables! Ryan had to give up his knive at the airport so we got a big knive also! That evening we found a good tailor shop and ordered some clothes to be made... more on that later.

Yesterday was such a busy day but one of the best yet! We started by sleeping in (for us that is until about 7:30am now) and then after breakfast we rented bikes for the day. We biked around and found a bookstore to trade our books at, then picked up some more food at the market for lunch later on. Then we biked about 4km to the beach, which was a beautiful ride right along a calm river! The beach was nice, but the water was considerably colder than the water in Thailand! We still went swimming and it was very refreshing! Then we biked back to our hotel and went swimming in the pool.

After another excellent lunch in our room we went to the tailor for our first fitting. Hoi An has so many tailor shops; probably every second shop is a tailor shop and that is certainly not an exaggeration! After a bit of research online, we found one that had been recommended and were very happy with the results. In total we got four pairs of dress pants, five shirts, and I also got a little jacket thing made that was quite funny. We will save the description of it for later when we can post a photo, and Ryan is insisting that I wear it when we go to the chocolate buffet in Hanoi. Let's just say it's not quite what I pictured, but it certainly made us laugh!

Anyway after going for a fitting at the tailor and requesting changes to be made, we went and saw the "sights" in Hoi An. First we went to a traditional music concert which was nice, and also had some interesting interpretive dance to it. Then we went to the Ceramics and Trade Museum, but it was not too exciting. I know this sounds very ignorant, but it just looked like a bunch of smashed up pottery to us! Then we went to a traditional house, the Tran house, where we got a tour. A lovely girl showed us through and described the history to us, but what was funny was that she tried to make us buy a bunch of stuff in the house "gift shop". Once it became clear that we were not interested in buying anything there, we were quickly escorted out of the house and that was the end of our tour! Then we went to an assembly hall, and finally to the Japanese covered bridge. Lots of sights to see! Then we went back to the tailor for another fitting. On to dinner now... we ate at a cute restaurant down on the water and had some tasty authentic Vietnamese food, and after headed to a French Boulangerie for dessert. Then.... back for yet another fitting at the tailor! One more small change to be made so we walked around for a hour, and then finally went back and picked up all of our stuff, went back to the hotel and ... gotta go bus is here, will finish this later!

Okay, sorry about that - our bus came half an hour earlier than it was supposed to. Anyway the day after that busy day, we did a cooking class in the morning where we made four traditional dishes: veggie spring rolls, garlic spinach, squid and mint salad, and grilled fish wrapped in banana leaf. They were very good! That afternoon (which is now yesterday) we took an overnight sleeper bus to Hanoi. It was the scariest bus ride of our lives and we are happy we made it here alive! Needless to say, we did not sleep too much on the 16 hour trip.

Today, after arriving at 6am, we found a hotel and then went to the Perfume Pagoda for the whole day, it was a nice trip with beautiful scenery... we are too tired to describe what it is right now... google it if you are interested!

Anyway tomorrow we are going to Halong Bay for three days. We spend the first night on the boat called a "junk" and the second night on Cat Ba Island. The tour is supposed to be great and we are really looking forward to it! Right now we are figuring out what to do about going to Sapa and what tour and all that to do... we were considering climbing Mount Fansipan, the highest peak in SE Asia, but after some research we decided that three days of hiking about 10 hours straight would be quite exhausting!

Ok, that is it for now, we will write next after we have been to Halong Bay!!