saigon. land of the motorbike.

There are around 8.5 million motorbikes in Saigon.

With only 8 million people in the city, there are more bikes than people.

Simply set foot in this bustling city center and you won't doubt this information.

Bikes are EVERYWHERE. Even crossing the street here is an event in itself.

Walking on the sidewalk is dangerous, as some of the motorbikes simply skip the road and pass the traffic by weaving through the pedestrians.

Sadly, we didn't have a ton of time in the city, so we tried to make the most of it.

Our co-worker Stacia had previously lived here and gave us plenty of recommendations.

We had an awesome American style breakfast here.

pancakes!

We wandered a bit around the neighborhood close to our hotel.

We went to Starbucks!

#ofcourse

We lounged by the pool. We read a book.

We went for a massage.

I can't even.

It was quite unlike anything I've ever experienced.

Well, maybe that co-ed Turkish hamam was almost as awkward.

We went for drinks at this local beer brewery.

There was a total downpour happening in the midst of this.

We went for pizza here.

The next day we did a motorbike tour that was a ton of fun.

We toured on bikes through this crazy city with local students guiding us around.

memorial to honor Buddhist monk Thich Quang Duc,
who burned himself to death in 1963 at the adjacent intersection

They zigged and zagged through the traffic to each destination.

Total craziness.

Notre Dame Cathedral in the city center

notice the total pro on the left
I was holding on for dear life on the right.

One of our early stops in the day was to a local market.

We were offered some desserts, which I politely refused...
milky, yogurty type products that are not cold or refrigerated? ugh. 

you can however buy your fish alive
or frogs
or eels
super weird...and kind of gross!

to go drinks from a road side kiosk
I managed to hold on with only one hand for a few minutes.

local temple that we visited

we loved our xo tour!
#jumpingforjoy

Wrapping up our short stay in Ho Chi Minh City, we were off to a few days of beach time!

hoi an, vietnam

Small town cities usually make great travel stops.

There are less people, less traditional touristy things and a slower pace.

While Hoi An, Vietnam still has a pretty solid tourist gig happening, it's a nice place to take a few paces back from the crazy that is big city Asia.

We arrived in Hoi An after our cruise in the northern part of the country. We flew from Hanoi to DaNang and our amazing hotel sent a car for us. I would absolutely stay at the same hotel the next time. (It's just far enough out of the busier city center and not too far from the beach.)

We spent our first day wandering into town, looking around and poking in and out of tailoring shops. We borrowed the hotel's bikes and easily cruised into the main part of town. We planned our stay in Hoi An to have enough time to get some clothes made at some different shops, which was three nights and four full days.

We ended  up getting things made at two different shops: one very high end and one random one. I had some pictures with me of things I had in mind. I had an eye on a couple shops in advance, but, in the moment, we went with the places that made us feel the most comfortable.

The high end shop quickly looked at my pictures and knew what fabrics they would use and could answer my questions. So this seemed to be the right place. I had a wool coat, a crepe romper and a dress made. I paid $275 USD for all of it combined. Overall, I thought that was a pretty good price. We had several fittings here and the process took the whole length of our stay.

trying on my charcoal wool coat.

The lower end shop was able to turn our requests around in 24 hours. Of course, here, we picked from dresses and things she already had made as samples and picked the fabric we wanted. Then we were measured and told to return the following day. Each dress here ran about $20 USD, more or less.

the 'less' expensive shop

I must say, I love this romper.

It happened that our first night in Hoi An was my birthday. Seems that our hotel took note of this when making a copy of my passport and after dinner that night this is what we discovered:

39 and counting.

While in Hoi An we also took a bike ride out to the beach. The sand was super hot, but the water was quite refreshing!

don't worry, only one person offered to thread our leg hair while on the beach

Since I was quite the veteran motorbike rider after our stay in Laos, we planned a Vespa tour across the Hoi An countryside. It was so much fun. We made several stops, including one at the home of a woman who weaves mats and a coffee bean roasting house. This is a highly recommended option in Vietnam!

so much fun.

Vespas. #awesomeness

prisma app. super fun.
we walked across this bridge.
i hated it.

we got to weave with these ladies. 

We also met up with our Australian friends from the Halong Bay cruise for dinner one night.

aussie friends. we had a lot of fun with them.
shout out to Rowan and Alex! 

lots of lanterns for sale in hoi an.

And we took a photography tour. We didn't love it, if we're honest. However, we did shoot some interesting things and we did like photographing these faces up close and personal.

We ate here. It was amazing. And local. So you should eat here too. They'll teach you how to eat their meal. There is no menu. You get what they serve.

We also ate here, here, here, here, and here. We liked them all. The white rose appetizer at the last place...awesome. The food at Mango Rooms...yum! Really, we found it hard to go wrong in Hoi An.

Links for the hotel and tours we took are earlier in the post. I can't stress enough how much we loved our hotel, Hoi An Holiday Villas. Please stay there. And tell them we said hello.

halong bay, vietnam

While planning our trip to Asia I came across a blog post talking about the beautiful scenery of Halong Bay, Vietnam.

I happily added it to my travel wish list.

Which we very conveniently crossed off this summer!

We flew to Hanoi and traveled by mini bus to Halong Bay.

It's quite a drive.

4 plus hours with a stop at a tacky place selling all sorts of goods.

Thankfully the landscape of Halong Bay made up for it.

We booked our two night, three day cruise with Paradise Cruises. It was more expensive than some boats, but we decided it wasn't something to skimp on.

And, for that, we were thankful.

view from the top

While cruising, we were treated to meals of several courses, learned how pearls are cultivated, passed through a floating village, kayaked, hiked through a cave, climbed to the top of one of the mountainous islands, and toasted with some not-so-delicious rice wine.

women in their boats would pass alongside the larger cruise boat
to try and sell you wine, snacks, and other trinkets

lovely sunsets

floating village

it was annoying how strictly they upheld the regulation
of wearing a life vest...it was just too hot for that!

a squid boat. they're attracted to the light.

We really enjoyed the cruise in Halong Bay. There were some positives and negatives as you'll find with any travel scenario. One being the local area's pollution. It's disappointing how much trash and debris is in the water of the area, so swimming in the water may not be your first choice. While there is some evidence that Vietnam is working to change this, they have a long way to go. We did get in the water once, but another cruise guest was almost immediately stung by a jellyfish when she entered the water, so we promptly left the water.

Traveler's Tips:

Deciding between the 1 night and 2 night cruise...I'm glad we did the two night. Those doing just one night must have felt like they were just hustled on and off the boat. And to have to make that van ride two days in a row? Ugh. No thanks. The two night cruise was slow paced overall and relaxing. It did feel like we did a lot of sitting, as there's not too much moving about to be done. Not everyone was thrilled that on the day in the middle you must leave the larger boat for the day's excursions while they pick up the new passengers. But this is well detailed on the site and reviews, so I was prepared for it. 

Visas for Vietnam are required for US citizens and take a little more pre-planning than some other Asian countries. You can not just show up and apply for a Visa on Arrival. Visas must be done in advance at a consulate near you or can be done on arrival with a letter from an agency within Vietnam that provides you clearance for this. Paradise Cruises wrote our letter for around $10 USD per person. This is the best explanation I found about the process.

lazy days in luang prabang

After several bustling days in Thailand, Caitlin and I headed to Laos.

On tiny Laos Airlines.

On the once a day flight from Chiang Mai.

overlooking the area around Luang Prabang

We landed in Luang Prabang and were hustled into a shared taxi van off to our Villa Ban Lakkham, our home for three nights.

Like the rest of Asia, Laos was HOT.

But unlike so much of Asia, Luang Prabang was so laid back, with little for the "have to do" list.

Which was awesome.

loving the innovative planters.
#usewhatyouhave

It was so green and lush in Luang Prabang. And everyone was so friendly. And adorable.

We relaxed and wandered the town.

bamboo bridge.
we did not cross it...

We shopped. We ate. We lounged at local cafes. (Utopia does actually exist here!)

#truedat

#child labor
If you can't sell your wares, maybe your child can guilt the tourists into it. 

We watched the monks walk the street to collect alms.

#rainydays

We did venture out of town to visit the KuangSi waterfalls, but we'll have to wait for Caitlin to share some pics from her GoPro. I didn't take my camera. We knew that everything would get wet and there wouldn't be storage to keep any extra stuff safe.

Just outside of town, this was fairly common. Rubble and a food stall. 

We learned about the tradition of Laos weaving and Hmong handicrafts. Check out Ock Pop Tok and Passa Paa. I bought soooooo much stuff.

This work was amazing, but a little beyond my budget.

a local residence

We helped the local economy with all the purchases we made.

Gorgeous designs from Passa Paa. 

Found this on our first night in town and decided we wouldn't bargain with anyone.
We'd pay what they were asking. 

life in Luang Prabang

And then we met an American named Michael.

His story to come in a separate post because it led to our most favorite experience of our trip.

Traveler tips:

While in Luang Prabang, we ate here, here (more than once!), and here. And some other places too, which apparently were less than memorable. : P

We stayed at Villa Ban Lakkham, linked above. Taxi service at the airport was shared. Grab a ticket from the desk. Price was quoted then, but I can't remember when we paid.

Visas for Laos were done at the airport. We waited in one long line to hand over the forms we received on the airplane, a photo and to pay. I think it was $36 (USD). Totally random amount. Then you wait some more for your visa to be put in your passport. After you get your passport back, you wait in another line to go through passport control and have your passport stamped.