We started in Ho Chi Minh city where I had just taken an overnight bus to from Sihanoukville in Cambodia. The ride in wasnt the worst I had been on but super long, although when we realised the size of Vietnam, overnight bus rides were going to become the norm. I met my brother when his flight got in and we had to venture off to the market to buy him some slops and shorts because his bag hadn't arrived.. shame, the jeans he arrived in weren't going to cut it! We spent a couple of days in Ho Chi Minh checking out the War Museum, visiting the zoo, crawling through the Cu Chi tunnels and eating all of the food, seriously Vietnamese food has got it going on! I also did the first thing I'd always been too chicken to do, I got a tattoo! My brother had the idea of getting a brother sister tattoo sometime in Vietnam. I thought it was a dumb idea at first, I actually think the literal words that came out of my mouth were "no that's dumb, I'm not doing that", but fast forward a few weeks later and we were both sitting at a Saigon ink in Ho Chi Minh deciding on the exact design of our little idea and then half passing out when the very nice Vietnamese man started sticking needles in us. It was a terrible but pretty exciting experience to say the least but I now have a little reminder forever of our Vietnam experience:)
We continued on to Nah Trang from there, the first of the 10+ hour long bus rides.. We arrived in the pouring rain, got ripped off by a taxi and had our bags soaked through.. but still pretty excited to explore the first of the many beach towns we would visit. Nah Trang was a bit of a strange place. A complete beach town with massive hotel developments forming on the beach front and resorts all over but not full of just any tourists, the tourist population there is probably around 80% Russian. All the shopfronts and menus include Russian writing with Vietnamese and English being second to that. A bit of a culture wobble. We managed to go on a pretty great snorkel trip complete with the best lunch on the boat, because travel really is all about the food right?
After making some friends in Nah Trang and realising we were all going the same route we headed off to Hoi An. Turns out everyone we met was staying in the same hostel. Win! Hoi An is the sweetest little place. It felt a lot like real Vietnam. There were no massive buildings, overly priced shopping malls or fast food restaurants but there were still tons of people and a million scooter drivers everywhere:) Besides being the best place to get custom clothes made from the tons of dressmakers there, I got the best jacket and a dress and skirt made for super cheap, it was a real relaxing place to be in. Easy going days visiting the markets, trips to the beach, and cycling around town was pretty much the gist of it. Going out in Hoi An proved to be loads of fun too. One bar owner decided to draw people in by making all drinks $1... the entire night. Needless to say we had no problems with that :) Go Hoi An!
