Tết 2018 (Part 2): The Marble Mountains and Hội An

Part 1 of tết 2018 can be read here

14-Feb-2018

The next day was glorious. I opened my hotel room curtains at an early hour to see the sun burning itself brightly onto the beach. It looked like Baywatch with the glittering sea, palm trees and beach huts. I was ready for the day, excited to think of the upcoming tour and seeing something different, but before breakfast I took a quick stroll to the sea. It seemed to be the one thing I always wanted to do throughout the tết holiday here. I wrote a valentines message in the sand for Luiza and then wrote about Ireland (this wasn’t too long after Ha Long so the phrase was fresh in my memory). I spent a minute to take in the sea breeze and waves crashing.

The morning buffet was tasty enough. The hotel had plenty to offer so I wasn’t left wanting for something to eat. Typical me went for some bitesized spring rolls and noodles with some condensed milk coffee. The receptionists were really friendly, always asking me about Ireland and hoping that the tour they booked to the Marble Mountains later in the afternoon would be satisfactory. They may overstep boundaries sometimes like asking if I was married or complimenting how handsome I was a lot, but this seemed to be a theme in Vietnam generally, that they would be upfront. In any case the food was nice and the day was beginning.

The morning started out similarly to the day before, chilling by the beach, walking around the promenade, and seeing what was around. However, today was the first day where lots of teachers were going to be arriving, so there would be some socializing soon. I got out my phone and started texting people to find out where they were.

Johnny had arrived, and despite calling Jacks number, he was the one that answered and demanded I come to their part of the beach further down the promenade with a bag of cans. It seemed to suit, so I got cans, a few bags of crisps and some snacks and headed a few hundred meters down.

It wasn’t long before I found a large group, with a bluetooth speaker and banter aplenty. Johnny was so pleased to see me again, being the first time since the CWD that we were together. He would recount his stories of Haiphong and then just take it easy by the beach. People would get in the beach at various times and dry off fairly quickly in the hot sun. We just chilled out, relaxed and had Larues, which turned out to be brewed in the central region.

The afternoon had passed, and I left them to it to go to the Marble mountains. It was a decent sized bus, picking up guests from various hotels and driving at a steady pace south. It wasn’t too long before we had left the city, somewhat surprisingly. Đà Nẵng has the same population as Dublin, but due to the high rise of most of the buildings it only takes a quarter to half an hour to get outside of the city proper, and not a good 2 hours in Dublin to get from Bray to Swords. After seeing green fields and some new developments, the bus turned right and towards what can only be described as marble pillars jutting out from the ground. It was interesting how flat the land was, yet have these hills jut out to a decent height. We got our tickets and walked in.

The walk around was peaceful and calming, as if I was walking up Killiney Hill again. The paths and steps were useful as a guide and we were given free reign of where to go, so long as we made it back to the bus in an hour. I was really enjoying myself taking photos of the old pagodas and temples. With all the greenery surrounding them it made for some excellent shots, as was an opening at the top of a staircase that led to the next section.

The highlight definitely was heading into a cave buried in the hill. A staircase led to a large chamber with a temple, Buddha statue overlooking the area, an alter and lit with candles. It was the stuff of adventures, as if you had discovered some new treasure in one of these temples and had to do a legger and escape before the cave collapses!

After another few flights of stairs back down to the ground floor, we had a chance to see the marble shops. Unlike Ha Long, this felt a little less like a tourist trap than the pearl shops, though only by a little. It was likely still more expensive than other places nearby, but it was worth a look. It also had statues I would actually like to take back to Ireland as well, and had a lot of effort put into the carving. Turtles seemed to be very common, as were fish and oddly enough large Christ statues, presumably for export. I left empty handed, but it was worth a look.

Finally, the bus drove further south and I got to see the wonder of Hội An for the first time. The sun was setting, and the town lit up with beautiful lanterns and candles floating down the river. Getting off the bus, it was hard to describe the beauty, but it was everything a foreigner thinks is beautiful about an old Asian aesthetic. The buildings were never more than 3 floors high, painted in bright yellow colours and with tiled rooftops, wooden window covers and old creaky doors. Plenty of outdoor dining was seen, and the streets could be narrow at times, allowing streamers of lanterns to cross between houses. There was very little in the way of Neon or air pollution. Despite feeling sleepy as a town from first appearances, it became clear that it was actually quite lively in certain quarters, with stalls selling everything from crab pancakes to ‘Vietnamese pizza’ or just rice paper with fillings and hot sauce. There were even tit tat, such as zippo lighters and Spiderman with an M16-toys are weird here.

Our guide took us to a restaurant on the vendors street, and we went inside. Here, we were given spring rolls, broths, a chicken and rice dish, and something that I instantly loved: Cao lầu. This dish had marinated pork, thick noodles, some salad leaves, crispy square crackers and in a broth that tasted like soy sauce or teriyaki. Delicious, cheap, and filling, it remains my favourite noodle dish in Vietnam (sorry Bún Chả). We also had iced tea and took in the dark wooden interiors, and it was all quite relaxing.

A few postcards bought later and we were back on the bus heading back to Đà Nẵng. I was dying to get back to Hội An after what I had seen. I had only touched the surface of what looked like a pleasant little town unlike anywhere else I had seen and to be there with a coffee in the morning and a beer at night with a Cao lầu was my new aim of the holiday. That would all have to wait another time, for now it was another night in the hotel and seeing what was happening the next day…