Hoai Thanh Hoi An

... a trip to My Son - Temples similar to Angkor Wat in Cambodia built by the Champa people in 4th - 13th century. A lot of it has been destroyed by..you guessed it.. the US army when they thought the VC were hiding inside the temples. But the stuff that is still there is quite impressive especially when you see how bad the parts that they have restored in the past few years are doing compared to the original parts.

Hoi An, Vietnam theharrisons

... with us, we booked into Red Bridge cooking school. This starts with a lovely drink at Hai Café, followed by a fascinating walk through the market, with our guide explaining everything to us. Then we boarded the Red Bridge boat and went along the river for about twenty minutes to the delightful restaurant. After a walk around their herb garden, we all made a range of courses, which we then ate. We stayed on in their pool for another 2-3 hours, which was very pleasant ...

... him, so had to grapple with his Vietnamese. Next to Mary was a young girl, from Hue, who was studying Japanese (and French, and English), and who had come with a whole group of young people for the concert and celebrations. In Viet Nam, they are very keen on official speeches and they work hard to make sure nobody is neglected. Unfortunately, these speeches went on and on for over an hour. We ended up watching one act and then went out for dinner.

There was also an ...

I'm sitting at a table on the beach in Hoi An. It is night now. The sun has set. Its presence barely noticed this afternoon. The clouds, undecided whether it would wreak havoc today, also is in repose. The wind is too lazy to do more than blow a gentle breeze. The ocean is a blanket of darkness – but for the sound of water, soothing and rhythmic. Stars now take centre stage. They come out to greet the darkened sky. This is their ...

... masked faces. Approaching Lak Lake, the last few kilometers of road were dreadful, but that gave us the opportunity to relax and take in the spectacular views of golden green rice fields in the late afternoon sun, with mountains in the distance. We stayed at a lovely resort, overlooking the lake, and even managed to have a swim in the pool, a delight at the end of a long, hot day.

Next morning, we visited Jun Village, near Lak Lake, home to a community of M’Nong ...

... shop around. We were courted as usual with bottles of cold water and tons of compliments. I ended up wasting a LOT of time my first day there getting super excited picking out all kinds of dresses, suits and fabric thinking I could afford it all. The women are super crafty and make it seem like everything will be a cheaper price than it turns out to be so I recommend getting a price upfront by clarifying how much for : size (I had one woman charge me almost ...