Our hotel is just outside of Hoi An on the Thu Bon River, and breakfast was served in a lovely thatched roof building right on the river. Wonderful view. We took a couple of hotel beach cruiser bikes for a ride out to Cua Dai Beach, and traveled along peaceful paths flanked by canals and rice paddies and farm land. One wrong turn took us out to an area of water coconut trees and a village there. Transportation on that part of the river was by basket boat, and they offered tourists rides into what appeared to be coconut groves in standing water. The boats were fascinating — round, with the paddler in front. Great wrong turn.
The next wrong turn took us down a very narrow single track that appeared to mostly be used by cows and water buffalo. We decided to try to cross over several of the canals because the beach looked like it was to our right, so we navigated a narrow berm over 3 canals only to find that there wasn’t a bridge over the final one. So, we went back the way we came, past the same brown cows who took no interest in us, although several appeared to follow for a bit.
Then the correct turn took us to the beach, which was sandbagged up, so there was almost no sand. And between the road and the sandbags, lots of palm trees and little red plastic chairs and tables and people selling noodles and bahn mi and other local food. We began our trip back and stopped instead at Paddy’s — an Irish bar and hostel for an early lunch. It was a beautiful day, and I so enjoyed a slow pace on a beater bike and absorbing the Vietnamese countryside.
We headed then to the Marble Mountains, which are just outside of Da Nang, along the China Beach coastal road. Consisting of 5 craggy marble outcrops topped with pagodas, it’s a long climb up and down, with lots of caves and rocky cliff sides for panoramic views. Each mountain is named for the natural element it’s said to represent: Thuy Son (Water), Moc Son (Wood), Hoa Son (Fire), Kim Son (Metal or Gold) and Tho Son (Earth). It was Thuy Son that is accessible, with a number of natural caves in which first hindu and later Buddhist sanctuaries have been created. The oldest pagoda in the area is Tom Thai, and we took the opportunity to rub the laughing Buddha’s belly for some extra luck. The place was overrun with tourists, many families and teenagers who mostly seemed to enjoy scrambling on the rocks vs. taking any time in the temples or pagodas. The view was amazing, and it was an experience — although clearly very commercialized.
Tonight we will go back into Hoi An for dinner. We are dining with Claire and Kevin from the UK who we met on the Halong Bay cruise. An eventful and very enjoyable day, once again.
Dear Santa, a basket boat would be awesome. Thanks.
This day seemed slower paced in a meandering kind of way. My kind of day!