Well we got up and shockingly it was Julie’s last day. How did this happen?!?!? She left for the airport in Da Nang at 8 AM. The hotel set up her driver and even gave her some snacks for the road. Its always sad to have these times when someone has to leave but dang we would have to say that we made the most of Julies time here! I cannot think of too many things we missed. Julie hung in there with every situation and enjoyed everything we did. So as she left Lyn and I mourned her loss by doing what we do best………..we had breakfast!!!!!!!

Our hotel check-in in Da Nang was not until 2 PM and our check-out time here in Hoi An was not until 12 so we had a leisurely few hours and we needed to walk to the post office and mail a few post cards. The post office was about a 15 minute walk away and even though it was morning things were heating up. After mailing a few things we were headed back home with just one more thing to see. The food dish that Hoi An is most known for is Cao Lau! Its a super yummy dish made of noodles and pork and the only place you can get it is Hoi An because the noodles have to be boiled in a special water from a well in town called the Ba Le Well. In theory all the noodles have to be boiled in this water for it to be authentic Cao Lau. We took some pictures of it and saw evidence that people were using it so I am assuming that people still cook the famous noodle dish with this water.

Anyway we went back to the hotel packed up and next thing we knew it was 12 PM. We hopped in our hotel provided car and received some of the same goodies Julie did and a big hug from the house Mom at our hotel. It took about 35 minutes and the next thing we knew we were at our hotel the Konoha Boutique Villa. This hotel had a small roof top pool and even an elevator! Our room was not ready yet and we did not know the lay of the land yet so we decided to find a Jollibee close by and have lunch in the AC and then come back and get our room. (By the way if your wife is Filipino….going to Jollibee is always a good choice!) We got a Grab car and headed to the Jollibee and it turned out it was less than 10 minutes away in a mall. This mall was super nice and even had an ice skating rink. We decided to eat lunch at Jollibee which consisted of half our breakfast from the hotel and some fries and drinks. After that we went to the movie theater and decided to watch a movie. I know I know we did not travel all the way to Vietnam to watch a movie?!?!?!?!? After traveling for about three weeks it actually felt good to do something normal. We bought popcorn with three flavors mixed together and watched a very good Korean movie with plenty of AC, and even two coke zero’s. It was like stopping to have a date night right in the middle of our trip! Anyway after that we headed back to the hotel had a quick swim and then headed out to see Da Nang at night. We took a Grab car to the tail of the Dragon bridge and walked over the bridge to the head side. The dragon changes colors every few minutes and is beautiful. On weekends several times a night the dragon actually puts on a show spouting water and fire from its mouth. You can see it here. Unfortunately we were not on a weekend night but we still really enjoyed the views.

When we got done taking pictures we looked down from the bridge only to see a nice size walking street / night market. It was sized just for us and after making our rounds and checking everything out we settled on come grilled pork on a stick of course and another one if those taco pizza things. And after that we got three small desserts to try. They put the most unusual things together but they all tasted so good. We walked around some more and while Lyn was buying something I dropped the equivalent of a $20 USD bill on the ground and someone quickly tapped me on the shoulder and showed me what I had done. That is a pretty large bill to drop over here in Vietnam and I was so thankful for the honest people around me. I always say that there are nice people all around the world and I am determined to meet them all! After Lyn shopped a little bit we went to the river and took a few more pictures then called a Grab car to pick us up.

We have had one problem with Grab my GPS always seems to be giving them my coordinates wrong by about 50 to 100 yards. This has made it hard to find each other from time to time! So now our routine is to call a Grab using their APP and then take a picture of the place that we are standing in front of and then take a selfie of ourselves so he knows who he is looking for. As you can imagine Lyn and I stand out over here,….. OK OK I am actually the one that stands out over here ha ha. Anyway we have not had a hard time getting a Grab car since. If anyone knows if there is something I can do to fix the GPS on my end let me know in the comments.

The next morning we had a free breakfast at the hotel which was pretty bland over all. The plan was to go to a lounge anyway and have lunch there. We arrived at the airport only to find out that our ticket counter would not open for 45 minutes and that there was no lounge at this airport that accepted our card. Bummer on all fronts. After 45 minutes we finally got our tickets to Hanoi. We went through Security and ended up finding great tables to sit at right next to the Burger King and decided this would be our lounge. Lyn made a few video calls and I worked on the blog. After 2 delays we finally were on our way to Hanoi! This will be our final stop in Vietnam. We have been on the road for over three weeks now and are still enjoying each and every day! Thanks for coming along with us!

Random Pictures