Hoi An, a town of 150,000 residents on the Thu Bon River, was one of our favorite places in Vietnam. The city’s name, meaning peaceful meeting place, is very fitting during the day time. However, bus loads of tourists arrive from nearby Da Nang for the evening hours to visit this UNESCO World Heritage Site. It is referred to as the city of lanterns and the yellow city. In addition, Hoi An is called the tailor capital of the country because of the numerous shops where customers can purchase custom-made, high-quality clothing for great prices. In hindsight we wish we had taken advantage of this opportunity while we were there. But that gives us just one more reason to return to this beautiful place!

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Old Town – Hoi An is a well-preserved trading port from the 15th to 19th centuries and we recognized some of the aspects of French, Chinese, and Japanese architectural influences as we walked and bicycled around the Old Town during our five-day visit. We had fun photographing some of the many interesting, yellow-colored, older buildings. Some historians believe that the stores, homes, and religious buildings were painted yellow because the color does not absorb many solar rays so the structures stay cooler. Others think that yellow was originally used because it represents royalty and superiority in many Asian cultures. Specifically in Vietnamese culture, yellow signifies wealth, prosperity, royalty, happiness, and change. A third theory is that yellow was the color of choice years ago since buildings look especially beautiful in the nighttime glow from the many lanterns around town. 

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Many Tourists – Hoi An is a very popular tourist destination and we experienced the excessive crowding of many pedestrians, bicycles, and motorbikes as we walked along the streets in the evenings. We were very thankful that the police officers vigorously enforced the Old Town’s bicycle and pedestrian-only zone from Friday afternoon until late morning on Monday. That meant we got a wonderful reprieve from dodging numerous motorbikes and hearing the seemingly incessant beeps of motorbike horns during a few days of our visit.

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Japanese Covered Bridge – Aside from the beautiful lantern shops, this almost 20-meter-long bridge seems to be the most photographed tourist attraction in Hoi An. It was built by the Japanese trading community to connect them with the Chinese community on the other side of a small stream. Each end of the bridge symbolizes the beginning (1593 – year of the dog) or completion (1595 – year of the dog) of construction with animal statues serving as guardians of the bridge.  A small temple, part of the north side of the bridge, sits right over the middle of the stream. 

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Lanterns – We loved the many colorful lanterns throughout the city, especially at night. It was hard to not go overboard with our picture taking of these incredibly beautiful pieces of art. We liked that most businesses decorated with lanterns and it was very hard to resist purchasing this type of souvenir from the many tourist shops.

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Evening Boat Ride – One of our most enjoyable activities in Hoi An was taking an evening lantern boat ride along a small part of the Thu Bon River near the Old Town. Elderly women along the river walkway sold paper lanterns with candles to tourists (like us) and residents. After our lantern candles were lit by our boat driver, we were encouraged to follow the tradition of making a wish as we placed each lantern in the water. The many colorful, illuminated boats and floating lanterns cast incredibly beautiful reflections in the river, a truly memorable and peaceful sight.

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Other Experiences and Places Around Town – One morning while walking along the river we head a propaganda message coming from the street speakers. We don’t know exactly what was said in the message since it was in Vietnamese. But we assume that the message was promoting a Vietnamese Communist government agenda. We briefly visited several other interesting and popular tourist spots in Hoi An’s Old Town: the Assembly Hall of Cantonese Chinese Congregation, the Hoa Van Le Nghia Temple, and the Phuc Kien Assembly Hall. And twice we used the recently-completed bridge built just for bicycles and motorbikes. This bridge, which is so new that it doesn’t appear on some cell phone map apps, provides a significant shortcut when going over the river from the main part of town to the large island within the city limits. Here are a few photos from these places. 

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My Son Sanctuary – We went on motorbike adventure from Hoi An to My Son Sanctuary, another UNESCO World Heritage Site. It is a cluster of about 70 abandoned and partially destroyed Hindu temples built with bricks between the 4th and 14th century. Even though it was a very warm day, we walked around most of the picturesque ruins in the cleared part of a beautiful jungle. Some of the buildings were destroyed in the late 1960s by US bombs during the Vietnam War. The North Vietnamese Army intentionally set up a camp in the temple area because they mistakenly assumed the US would not attack that location because of the religious and historical significance. We obeyed signs instructing us to stay on designated paths because the surrounding area may still have unexploded bombs. Our two hour ride to and from My Son included two new and very memorable experiences. With the assistance of hand directions from a Vietnamese girl who spoke no English, we selected the shorter route to My Son.  This included taking a dirt trail (not road) through a cemetery and driving on a very narrow, but separate, motorbike lane of a metal railroad bridge over a river. The skinniness of the lane was nerve wracking for us, with Jerry as driver and Susan as passenger. And to add even more excitement on our trip back to Hoi Ann, a train travelled over the bridge as we were attempting to drive across it. Our excuse for stopping was to get a photo or two of the train on the bridge. Plus the bridge (as well as our nerves) seemed less shaky after the train had passed. 

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