Hoi An, Vietnam (Part 3): Ancient Town At Night in Pictures

Ancient Town in Hoi An, Vietnam is very quiet during the day on weekends. You can walk around and grab lunch and you might be the only person in that place. It's laid back, you might get a few tourists here and there walking around, and many of the locals are probably at home relaxing.

However, at night, it's a completely different atmosphere. Tourists are everywhere including Vietnamese tourists from other cities in Vietnam. You'll see backpackers, Chinese tourists, some Koreans, and a lot of locals trying to get you to pay for a  boat ride along the river. The Japanese Bridge is the most crowded. Although it's not a very long bridge, it will take you about 10-15 minutes to get across the bridge. You also have to dodge people as many people want to take pictures while on the bridge. The main reason it's so crowded at night is the beautiful and colorful lanterns that adorn each bar, shop, restaurant, cafe, and massage parlor. Here are just a few pictures that I took while in Ancient Town at night. Enjoy!

In front of the Vinh Hung Hotel

In front of a two-storey cafe

In front of the same cafe

Gotta love the color choices!

In front of a restaurant and cafe

Large lanterns on the first floor and small ones on the second floor

Different shapes and colors of lanterns

Waiting for business

Illuminated with lots of orange with a touch of blue and yellow

Green and white lanterns

The locals guarding a shop

The Japanese Bridge

The Japanese Bridge

Near the Japanese Bridge with a Chinese touch

Lanterns in front of an array of restaurants

Scott Worden (The L.A./Seoul Guy)

Instagram: l.a.seoulguy

Hoi An, Vietnam (Part 2): Ancient Town During the Day

Our hotel, the Tropical Hoi An Resort gave us free rides to and from Ancient Town until 9:00pm. Ancient Town was about a 10- minute drive from our resort.

What is Ancient Town? (Source: Vietnamtravel.org)


It's a port in Hoi An that was very active between the 15th and the 19th centuries. It was first settled by the Champa people who were Malay-Indonesian people from Java. They settled in Hoi An in 200 BC. The Cham people had a strong Kingdom but had conflicts with the Viet people in the north, the Khmer people in Cambodia, and in the 13th century Kublai Khan invaded the Champa Kingdom. The leader of the Cham people Che Bong Nga ("The Red King") reunited his people once again. However the Viet people overpowered the Cham people in the 15th Century.

During the 16th and 17th centuries, Hoi An, which was called Hai Pho ("seaside town") at that time, became a very important port city in Southeast Asia. The Japanese built a settlement on one end of the town. Various merchants from different countries came to do global trade before the term even existed. They included the Chinese, Indian, and Dutch. Hoi An was an important stop along Silk Road as it exported ceramics all over even as far as Egypt.

However, during the Nguyen Dynasty, open trade was slowed down in order to stop the influence of foreigners, which hurt Vietnam for the next two centuries. In turn, this brought stagnation to Hoi An. By the time the lords changed their mind, it had already damaged Hoi An's economy permanently. The French started to rapidly influence Danang making it the most important port in Vietnam. Also, stronger trading vessels were being constructed, which required a deeper port. This officially eliminated Hoi An as an international trading port city once and for all. However, there is a positive thing to look at here. Danang became influenced by the culture, style, and wealth of Europe while Hoi An kept its mainly Vietnamese roots and kept its Asian heritage and traditions in tact.

Today, Hoi An welcomes many backpackers with bars, restaurants, and internet cafes. You can also find many craft shops, stores that cater to Vietnamese fabric, and stores that sell Vietnamese ceramics. It became a UNESCO World Heritage site in 1999 and is not yet overrun with tourists.

The distinct conical hat in Vietnam (see two pictures below), is called the Non La, and it can be seen everywhere. It is used to prevent people from getting wet during the rain, shade themselves when it's hot and sunny, and even used as a basket to put fruit and vegetables in. The origin of this hat began from a legend and you can read about it in this article.

I loved the unique style of some of the buildings. This style was influenced by the French.

Japanese Bridge

A guy relaxing on a hot day with many motor bikes lined up down an alley

A cafe with French style exterior

Vietnamese fashion

We stopped by a local foreigner bar to see if we could get some food.

We had good but not the best Pho that I have ever had...The best Pho I had was in Ho Chi Minh City.

Banana Pancakes

Here is it for just $1. Mmmm...Delicious!

Overall: It's very quiet during the day but can be a bit overwhelming at night. The tourists come to see the lanterns and take a lot of pictures of them. You'll see a lot of Chinese tourists, backpackers, and Vietnamese people from other regions. Be aware of pickpockets as you cross the Japanese Bridge since it's the most crowded area at night.

However I enjoyed Ancient Town. I enjoyed the atmosphere, the food and got some Vietnamese coffee. It's a vibrant and an enjoyable area of Hoi An!

Scott Worden (The L.A./Seoul Guy)

Instagram: l.a.saeoulguy

Hoi An, Vietnam (Part 1): The Hoi An Tropical Resort

As I mentioned in a previous blog post, my wife and I spent 6 days in Vietnam last month. In that blog post I talked about our last stop in Vietnam, which was Halong Bay. Today, I'm going to begin Part 1 of our first stop in Vietnam: Hoi An. I'm going to specifically talk about the Hoi An Tropical Resort.

My friend Stephen Keen recommended me to visit Hoi An because he said it was his favorite city in Vietnam. My wife and I tried to choose a resort carefully because knew that we could find a really nice resort at a reasonable price. After combing through booking.com, we made a very solid choice in the form of the Hoi An Tropical Resort. Unfortunately we had a limited time constraint due to wanting to see Hanoi and Hoi An. Therefore, we could only stayed for two days, which sped by faster than Halley's Comet. Although the time at the Hoi An Tropical Resort was short, it was very sweet.

Let me give you details of our arrival. When we arrived in Danang, someone from the hotel picked us up and drove us to the city of Hoi An. The trip was about 40 minutes and it was a steamy, wet day! After my wife and I checked in, the staff was nice enough to escort us to our rooms via golf cart. I was pleasantly surprised by the wonderful customer service. Here's a picture of what the rooms look like:

They are very clean inside. We got free water, toothbrushes, toothpaste, and towels of course. After we dropped off our suitcases we headed to the restaurant, which was near the pool and about 30 feet from the beach!

Hoi An Tropical Resort pool on a steamy day

Another view of the pool

My first meal was noodles with meat and vegetables. It cost about $4 at this very nice four-star resort and I was quite satisfied! We also ate breakfast and one more dinner here because the dishes were much better than we expected. The price of the food was inexpensive and the quality of it was outstanding. 

Not a bad first choice for dinner! Here's mine!

Here's my wife's. Yes, the theme was noodles!

If you would like to know how breakfast is, it's even better than dinner. For breakfast you can get an omelette, pho, waffles, potatoes, sausage, vegetables, passion fruit juice, orange juice, coffee, etc. The layout was fantastic. You can see me eating breakfast here:

Breakfast during the next morning

While we were eating dinner on our first night, it poured off and on. We knew we were in the midst of rainy season, but we were hoping to get at least two or three days of sun while we were there.

After dinner, we walked around the grounds and took a look at how close we were to the beach. There was a cool swing that my wife got on. You can tell that they take care of this hotel well by how trimmed the grass is.

The next day we had postcard resort weather. It was unbelievably beautiful and looked a lot closer to the pictures we saw on booking.com.

The next day was much sunnier!

We also got a massage at this hotel in a separate building on the premises of the resort. The staff in that building accepted us quickly despite us not making a reservation. They even had us picked up by golf cart to take us back to our room. When we finished our massage, they had umbrellas waiting for us, so that we could get onto the golf carts without getting wet. That was V.I.P. service to the max. 

And here's the best part about this hotel. We reserved a Deluxe Double Room with Ocean View for a price of $175.50 (USD). My wife and I loved the experience so much that I don't mind advertising for them on my blog. Thank you to the Hoi An Tropical Resort in Hoi An, Vietnam!

Scott Worden (The L.A./Seoul Guy)

Instagram: l.a.seoulguy

Halong Bay, Vietnam (June 2018)

Three weeks ago, my wife traveled to Hoi An, Halong Bay, and a brief stay in Hanoi. Today, I'll tell you about our wonderful trip to Halong Bay. Next time, I'll let you know about the very underrated city of Hoi An.

Before going to Halong Bay I heard a lot about it. Many students talked about it and one Kiwi friend mentioned how she had a blast when she and her husband went there last year. Because of hearing about it so much, I knew it would be nice but I didn't want the hype to cause me to have high expectations of this place.

While my wife and I were booking flights and hotels for Vietnam, I told my wife that we should wait until we are in Vietnam in order to book our tickets to Halong Bay. Why? I wanted to hear what the locals said about the place first and more importantly, every hotel and travel agency in Hanoi will try to offer you the best deal there. Sure enough. We tried our own hotel and they gave us some options but they seemed a bit expensive, so we tried two travel agencies. The first one gave us the same options and although the prices were slightly cheaper, we tried another one. We decided on staying to get a 1-night/2-day cruise and it was rated three stars. The deal we got was pretty amazing. We paid $115 which included all of our meals, a cabin, kayaking, hiking, swimming, fishing, and exploring a cave.

From our hotel, our guide, Thang (from Legacy Legend Cruises) picked us up at 8:00am at the Hanoi Space Hotel. He was a great guide because he was funny, patient, and very detailed into explaining what we were to do while we were on our cruise. He even had to wait for a group of five Chinese people that were still hiking while the rest of us were sitting on the boat wondering where they were. The rest of us went back to our cruise boat while Thang kept searching for them. What a tough job that a tour guide has!

After we arrived at our spot in Halong Bay, we went hiking. From there we took a long 4.5 hour ride in a van to the city of Halong. But the ride wasn't so bad. We had one rest stop where you can go to the bathroom, but some snacks, or buy some souvenirs. On top of that we saw some beautiful landscape along the way:

On the way to Halong Bay

Once we got there, we got out of our vans, and boarded our boat:

About ready to board our boat

Here's a look at our cabin. It wasn't huge but it was comfortable and since we were on a three-star cruise, we couldn't complain. We got toothpaste, shampoo, two cheap toothbrushes, and a bed that was comfortable enough:

Our cabin

And then we were on our way with some other vessels along the bay:

Just leaving the city of Halong

Next, we could start to see the limestone karsks and islets approaching in the distance:

Limestone ahead!

Limestone karsks and isles

And of course we had to take pictures while on the sundeck of the boat:

After a great lunch, we got into a smaller boat and headed to one of the islets to go hiking. Once we got there, we saw a statue of a Soviet astronaut, Gherman Titov, which was put on the islet in 2015. He apparently contributed to the reunification and liberation of Vietnam. You can learn more about him in this article.

Ti Top (Titov) Island

Once we finished a great lunch, we got into a smaller boat and headed to one of the islets to go hiking. Immediately after we got there, we saw a statue of a Soviet astronaut, Gherman Titov, which was put on the islet in 2015. He apparently contributed to the reunification and liberation of Vietnam. You can learn more about him in this article.

From there we hiked up the mountain, which took us about 40 minutes coming up and down. The view from the top was pretty amazing!

We then made our way down but we didn't have time to swim at Ti Top Island since we would go to another area to swim and kayak at. Eunhee and I were hot from the heat and humidity so we couldn't wait to get into the water. From there, most of us took the small boat back to our cruise boat to get changed except the group of five Chinese people that Thang couldn't find (as mentioned earlier). We rested for about an hour in our cabins before Thang let us know that kayaking was the next activity. All of the people from our cruise boat got back into the small boat and had a nice ride to our kayaking area.

After we were told what we could do, Eunhee and I got into our kayak and we just admired the scenery all around us. Since Eunhee wasn't a great swimmer, I would joke around and rock the boat a bit to try and freak her out. After a couple of times, I thought that was enough and let her enjoy the scenery. Haha!

Sadly, Eunhee couldn't get into the water since our kayaking area was in the middle of the ocean. However, I had to jump in to get refreshed and the water was really nice! I just wish Eunhee could have enjoyed it with me.

After we swam and kayaked, we went back to our cruise boat to rest. Dinner would be coming up next! We got on the sundeck and took in the beautiful scenery at night and were mesmerized by how quiet it was. We could see various other vessels lit up as it got darker and darker.

Halong Bay at Twilight

Getting darker

Then we ate dinner and rested before we tried our shot at squid fishing. Squid fishing was pretty simple. We just got a pole, no bait, and a hook. It was like competing in the lottery. The chances of catching something was REALLY small. But lo and behold, Eunhee caught a squid and she was the ONLY one on our boat that was able to.

A very tiny squid that Eunhee caught!

Just before she caught the squid

After squid fishing, we went to sleep and rested for the next day. The next morning, we had breakfast and then went back onto the small boat and headed to a cave. Eunhee and I were both expecting the cave to be small and interesting but we didn't expect how big it was going to be. We were pretty stunned at how tall and wide it was with various stalactites and stalagmites lining up the astounding mystery of God's creation. We were thoroughly impressed and it was definitely the cherry on top of this fantastic experience. Here are some various pictures of what we saw:

Myself exploring a cave!

We are so short compared to the height of the cave!

How enormous and beautiful it was!

Outside the cave

Outside the cave

After we went caving, we had lunch and headed back to Halong Bay. It was totally worth the experience and I totally recommend anyone to give it a shot. You won't be disappointed!

Scott Worden (The L.A./Seoul Guy)

Instagram: l.a.seoulguy