Day 11 and 12

Day 11 - Hoi An and Despicable Me
On our second day, we hit the beach again, except that we woke up late, so we didn't get to the beach until 5:30 (Jess was a lazy butt and slept in). After our swim, we got some op-la for breakfast, which is thin strips of steak with over-easy eggs and french bread.

After breakfast, we headed towards Hoi An, which is a small vintage town about 30 minutes away. My uncle drove along the coastline the entire time. It was interesting to see how almost every inch of the coastline was being turned into a resort. I don't know how I feel about it yet, since I'm not sure what all of this construction will mean for the future of the area, but resorts don't really cater or reflect the local population. What was the weirdest thing was that we passed a casino that won't allow locals in; only foreigners could play in this casino.

Hoi An itself has a very vintage feel to it, though it has become a tourist attraction. We were in the old market street, which is now a line of stores, tailors, and restaurants that have maintained their older architecture, but have updated their services and products. Of course, that also means that the prices were tailored toward tourists. We got through it in a couple of hours, and headed to a restaurant to enjoy a meal of hen xup banh trang. It was definitely better in Hue, but definitely still good.

The rest of the day was chill. I took some time to study before we took everyone to watch Despicable Me, since they hadn't seen it yet. Everyone LOVED the movie. The youngest girls were all laughing like crazy. We then had a big meal to close out the night - banh xeo, grilled beef and nem nuong, with rice paper for us to make rolls with.

Day 12 - Ba Na
Our usual routine is that we leave the hotel at 5ish, and then when we get to the beach, we take a walk along the coastline before jumping into the water. We had to skip that a bit this time because Vy, my uncle's 8-year-old daughter, had a dance recital and my uncle's family woke up late (while I was on time, huzzah!). We still swam though, and of course, it felt great.

After the beach, my uncle dropped his wife and daughters off at where the recital was happening and we grabbed breakfast, which was bun cha ca, not Hanoi-style. Bun cha ca here in Da Nang is basically fishcake noodle soup. It was good, especially with picked onions.

After breakfast, we headed out to Ba Na, which is a temple community turned resort high in the mountains outside of Da Nang. To get up to Ba Na, you have to ride a sky shuttle that crosses THREE mountains and goes up about a mile above sea level. Most of the ride itself was always about about 500 feet away from the ground itself. Obviously, the ride up to Ba Na can be exciting or terrifying depending on how much you like heights. I found it to be a bit of both.

Being built on a mountain side, exploring Ba Na meant climbing up and down a lot of stairs. Being a mile up in the thin air and hot sun meant that exploring Ba Na was a major workout. In 10 minutes, I was sweating as if I had been working out all day. We hit the highest part of Ba Na, looked around the small community and then made our way over to the temple itself, where we had lunch.

The people who cared for the temple were kind enough to let us borrow a table and chairs so that we could have our lunch by the temple instead of the other rest areas or the restaurant. We had banh mi sandwiches, some super buttery French pastries, fruits, and sticky rice. The whole time that we were eating, the temple's dogs walked between our chairs and under the table looking for food. Of course we weren't feeding them, so they just sat there. One dog even fell asleep on my foot.

After lunch, we cleaned up after ourselves and explored Ba Na some more - specifically the resort villas. Literally, this meant that we walked into a villa, which had 4 rooms for people to stay in, sat in the common area, which was just tiles, and played cards for a couple of hours. I taught my cousins how to play California Speed, which they loved as much, if not more, as regular Speed.

Eventually, some hotel workers did come to the villa, but only to do work and not to kick us out. In fact, my uncle was talking to them for a bit, which is totally not what I expected.

We spent most of the day at Ba Na, so we didn't get back until 4ish. We stopped for some banh canh with a beef bone and fishcakes. When we finally got back, I just rested until I met up with my paternal grandmother for dinner. She's a pretty devout buddhist, so I was surprised when she suggested we get some regular food, but we went to a restaurant that served com nieu, which is rice cooked in a clay pot, and ordered caramelized sardines, caramelized pork, stir-fried beef, sour fish soup, and greens.

Eating and exploring so much left me spent, so I went to sleep at 8:30pm.