Wednesday 24 October 2012

Hoi An - Best place for shopping!

Today we went to a place called My Son.  This is a place where they discovered several temples built by the Cham people.  These temples date back 1700 years ago and are quite amazing.  Unfortunately during the war the U.S. bombed the site and half were destroyed.  Very tropical in this area.  It was very hot and humid.  We got back to Hoi An in time for lunch and Hai (our guide) took us to a restaurant called Miss Ly Cafe.  Very famous and after eating there I now know why.  We are hooked. Best food ever!  The owner is from New York but has been in Vietnam for several years.  He married Miss Ly and they run the business together.  As far as I am concerned this is the place to eat in Hoi An!
Had a walking tour after lunch to view a few places in Hoi An.  One is called the Japanese Bridge.  Back when this town was a bustling seaport half the town was Japanese and the other Chinese.  They did business together but lived separately with the Japanese bridge connecting the two areas.  When the harbor became too shallow for the large ships to enter the seaport closed and the Japanese left.  Now the town relies on tourism.
We then went to our tailor and tried on our clothes that we ordered.  Minor adjustments needed which they will do and then we will pick up tomorrow morning.  I am very pleased with my suit.  We ended up ordering night wear in a beautiful royal blue silk.  Can't wait to see how that feels!
Back to our hotel for a dip in the pool.  A large tour of Australians and New Zealanders are here.  What a fun group.
We went back to Miss Ly for dinner since it was so good.  Splurged and had a bottle of Pinot Grigio, prawns done in garlic and onion, pork fried rice and fried wonton as our appetizer.  Finished it off with frozen yogurt with chocolate and peanut sauce.  Excellent!  This came to a cool 910,000 dong.  Scary counting out 10 - 100,000 notes.  That's one million dong.  Works out to $50 which was an expensive meal.  Considering the wine was $30 all that food was only $20.  What a deal.
We headed on back to the hotel and just on the other side of the bridge we decided to go for a massage.  We had talked to this young girl previously and told her we would come for massage.  With the wine to give us courage we decided to indulge.  30 minutes each for 100 dong.  That's $20 or $10 each and what a great massage!  Back tomorrow for waxing and hot stone massage after we travel to the beach for the day!  What a life!

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