It’s a quaint town and they have about 18 or 20 different cultural sites. You purchase a “ticket” with 5 different stubs on it & you are supposed to pick 5 different things to see. We start by going across the bridge into old town Hoi An:
When you see them, they cut off one of the stubs. There are several chinese assembly halls – what looked to me like chinese temples, old houses & several museums. We opted for one assembly hall & all the museums. The chinese assembly hall had these really cool dragons:
It had this claw on that tried to grab Jackson!
Michelle spied this nondescript long hallway and we decided to see what lay beyond the blue door. It was a really nice courtyard with an even awesomer set of dragons!
For future attendees, we both thought the attractions ranked as such:
1. Museum of Folk Culture
2. Quang Trieu Assembly Hall (didn’t see the others)
3. Ceramic Museum
4. Japanese Covered bridge
5. Museum of Hoi An History & Culture
6. Hoi an Art Craft Manufacturing workshop – This was just a tourist trap with shops inside.
A few takeaways? All the old writing looked like chinese. The French invented the phonetic alphabet they have today. I don’t speak / read chinese, but the old stuff sure looked like it. Hoi An was a central hub for trading up until the 17th century at which point, it wasn’t anymore. No warmongering evidence anywhere. That was interesting.
Despite the fact that it was a pleasant 80 degree day, and despite the fact that we started pretty early, we still had a “whinybutt 12yr old” who we proceeded to buy a banh mi for and dump him back at the hotel at noon.
Michelle and I then got on a few old bikes & went about10k to a restaurant called “Baby Mustard” which was so awesome, I booked a cooking class with them in two days hence. It was nice not having whinybutt with us since we can eat spicy food and leisurely visit the beach afterwards, which was only another 1-2K down the road.
We arranged a snorkeling trip out to Cham Island for day after tomorrow as we have another cooking class tomorrow from 9-3 – for a total of two cooking classes while we’re here!
millerpdx 