It was a long travel day between Sapa and eventually reaching our hotel in Hoi An. Next time, I’d recommend a night in Hanoi in between, rather than mixing the 6 hour hilly drive plus a flight.
Hoi An is an old favourite of ours, gorgeous and seemingly the whole town is focused on food, massages and custom-made clothes. A pretty good focus, and we pretty much stayed within this purview!
The hotel we chose for this stay is the Allegro in the Little Hoi An group. I’d looked at them for the last trip here but this time we’re travelling in low season and I had booked just as Vietnam had opened its borders so it was within budget. It’s a lovely hotel – pool, good a/c in the rooms, attractive decor, and they’d even arranged to provide me with little rice muffin/cakes with breakfast as I’d requested GF. The pool is lovely, with signature Hoi An lanterns strung around it, and it’s warm! Almost like taking a bath, but the ambient temp is 29C min – 38C max, so I guess that’s what you get in an open-air pool!
We had decided to stay a week in Hoi An as we wanted to have time to get clothes/shoes made as well as explore a bit more around the town. Unfortunately I’d picked up a cold as we were leaving Sapa (unsurprising given the changing conditions we’d been experiencing) and then a touch of traveller’s tummy a few days into the Hoi An stay, so I wasn’t up to much. We’d brought RAT tests with us and they continued to indicate no covid, so I tried to stay masked and coped as best I could in 38C heat.
On every corner, tourists were vying for the best instagrammable photo, posing against the traditional coloured walls and framed with bougainvillea or other creepers and wearing flowing chiffon dresses and pastel colours. We felt very uncool in comparison!
Our shopping foray started with the classic Yaly. I ordered a few work shirts in cotton and linen, and R did the same. These had two fittings and then they were finished and sent to the hotel. Yaly does a great job with classic lines so I usually get workwear here like shirts, shirtdresses etc. I did get a wonderful leopard silk chiffon dress here the first time I was in Hoi An, but I haven’t seen a fabric that calls to me like that since.
The second tailor we hit was Bebe, R’s favourite from previous years. R asked for a jacket, trousers, and some shirts. I ordered some slightly different work shirts from rayon, cotton and linen, wide-legged work pants in linen and suiting, a ruffle-back trench coat and a maxi dress. My peplum work shirts are perfect – they are easy to move in, flattering and cool to wear. The work pants needed a few fittings to make sure my prior surgery lumps and bumps aren’t emphasised, and the dress was almost perfect the first try. The jacket looked great from the back but the front kept confounding everyone and just wouldn’t sit right. After 6 fittings, we sadly called it quits on that one, but I’m really happy with the rest.
We also tried a new-to-us tailor: Ca Li Tailor, that I’d read about on Tripadvisor. I ordered a linen top and cropped pants, plus strawberry print PJs for my niece (strawberries are her favourite fruit). These were the quickest to be finished, two days later, with only one fitting in the middle. The top was a little boxy, but after a quick fitting it works a lot better, and the pant was great on the first go. They are further out from the Old Town though, so a little less convenient than Yaly and Bebe. If we’re staying close to this tailor next time I’ll definitely go back.
I wanted some custom shoes, as my feet are wide and I have colourful tastes! We stopped at Friendly Shoes and Bags, picking out a pair of sandals and ankle boots, then asking if they could take inspiration from a favourite pair if shoes I have. These turned out the best of all of the shoes I ordered, even though on the first fitting they fit the worst. Now they are great! I also ordered a matching bag inspired by a slouch bag I’d seen online, which looks amazing. The only sour note to this order was when unwrapping my shoes to pack them, I noticed the silver glitter leather of the sandals was partly unpainted on four or five parts of the shoes. Lucky it was before we’d left, so I took them back to Friendly and they rushed a new pair into production and back to me in two hours. The glue is still drying, but at least they are silver all over!
We also tried out Moon Handbags and Shoes as R wanted to get some leather gifts made, as well as another pair of multicoloured sneakers like he’d had done on our first Hoi An trip. I also wanted to try to have a couple of gifts made up, so I asked them about taking inspiration from a leather and fabric foldable bag I’d seen online. We couldn’t find the right fabric, but found something that would do the trick. The prices here were higher than I’d expected, but there was a bit of haggling to be done at least, which is always fun.
5 lots of shops to visit each day for updates and fittings took up a lot of our time on the first few days, and combined with not feeling 100%, we didn’t do much more than wander the Old Town, do fittings, drink copious litres of water, and occasionally have a meal or a massage.
Onto the food! By later in the week when we were finished with the bulk of our shopping, we decided to do a cooking class as we both loved the Banh Xeo (crispy rice pancake) and we don’t think we’d done a class on this before.
R did some online research and came up with Gioan Cookery Class who lets you customise the dishes you learn, rather than learning a set menu like the others. These people also have an airconditioned kitchen, which is a plus in the middle of Hoi An summer! Our teacher, Vina, was charming and entertaining as well as very informative and knowledgeable about the food. After a quick walk to the local market for some e made four dishes: Banana Flower Salad, Country Pancake (Banh Xeo), Claypot Eggplant, and Banana Pancake. They were all delicious and we had totally too much food. Highly recommended if you’re looking for cooking classes.
Some standout meals:
- Morning Glory Signature restaurant – we were seated next to an Australian/Japanese couple and had a great chat about everything under the sun, while nomming on delicious food
- We had a set menu at our hotel (Allegro) as part of our accommodation deal – this included some delightful small dishes
- Mom’s restaurant – we had Cau Lao which was great!
- Banh Xeo at Quan Cam Nam
- Black Sesame Soup at a street vendor on our last morning – R had read about this so we went on a soup-finding mission with only hours to spare before we left. It’s more like a sesame rice porridge consistency – delicious!
We also had a couple of massages at The Lemon Tree that was recommended to us by the owner of Friendly Shoes and Bags. The ladies at The Lemon Tree did a great job, and you also have a complimentary juice at the end, and they will drop you back at your hotel! The first time we used this service, their usual driver wasn’t available, so they offered to take us back on the back of their scooters. Who needs roller coasters when you have the thrill of Vietnamese traffic to contend with! We booked a final massage on our last day and had a much more sedate car transfer.
It was lovely to visit Hoi An again and have a relaxed stay. Like last time, we were amazed at the changes in the last four years, but this time it was changes due to low tourist numbers – the vendors seemed pretty desperate for a sale at times and more than the usual kind of happy to have us utilise their services. It was nice for us to have it a little quieter in Vietnam than we’d experienced in the past, but hard for the people who work in the industries around tourism to just find other jobs, especially as when talking to some of the people, there didn’t seem to be a lot of support from up top.
Next stop: Singapore for a four-day jaunt before we head home.
Two Weeks Away 