Thursday, April 23rd – HANOI, VIETNAM to Danang and Hoi An

Thursday, April 23rd – HANOI, VIETNAM to Danang and Hoi An

We were picked up at the hotel by Duong at 7:30 a.m. to catch our flight to Danang. We drove through parts of Hanoi that we had not seen before. Duoang pointed out the lake where John McCane crashed and was captured. The lake is very small. There is a memorial plaque there to recognize his capture.

McCane visited this lake and also the prison where he was kept for about 6 or 7 years.

While we were driving to the airport, we heard loud music. At first, we thought that it was coming out of a car but were told by Duong that it was coming from a speaker mounted on a telephone pole on the street. He then told us that the entire city has this speaker system which allows the government to not only play music but also to broadcast propaganda to the people throughout Hanoi. It was originally set up in the 1950s because most people did not have radios or tvs and the government wanted to make sure that they could easily communicate with the masses. We said goodbye to Duong at the airport and said that we would keep in touch with him and when we arrived at our hotel in Hoi An today, we had already received an email from him.

We traveled on Vietnam Air (flight 8) to Danang and were met by our new guide, Dien. She was born in 1971 so she is the same age as Michael. She is married with two children, a boy, age 12 and a girl, age 10. She met her husband at the University. She has been a tour guide for 7 years. Unlike our guides in the past, she traveled three hours from her home in Hue to meet us and she will travel with us now for three days. From the airport, we stopped at the Champa Sculpture Museum which was very interesting and she was very knowledgeable. It had artifacts from the 12^th to the 15^th centuries. Danang is a big port city and the US Marines had a very large military complex here. It is now used by the Vietnamese Airforce. Now that we are in the Central part of Vietnam which is considered to be part of South Vietnam, we sense a big difference in how the US is thought about. In the North, we were the enemy and in the south, we were the ally. In Hanoi, we felt that there was a lot of government control and some fear. In the south, things seem different at this point. We were shocked to see a large casino being built by an American investor near the marine complex. The casino looked as large as we see in Las Vegas. Things appear much modern here.

We then visited Ngu Hanh Son Mountains called the Marble Mountains and the one that we climbed was called the Water Mountain. Our guide was surprised that we were interested in making the climb of 240 steps up to the top. Lenny counted each of the steps as we went up and Dien thought that was really very funny. She also said that most older Americans (hah – she means us!) declined the offer to walk up. It was almost 100 degrees and we did just fine! On the way, we saw a beautiful pagoda with a huge budha and then another one that had 7 tiers. There was also a very big cave near the top which was used by the viet cong to hide from the Americans and they shot the Marine helicopters down through a large hole in the top of the cave. The Americans eventually put tear gas into the cave to defeat the Viet Cong.

After climbing down the mountain which was a much easier trip, we were taken to the Ancient City of Hoi An which is located on the South China Sea. We were at the same Sea yesterday just a two hour plane ride north of here. Hoi An is a charming beachside town with lots of shops and restaurants. We had a great lunch with foods quite different from the North which included the best eggplant dish we have ever had. We are going to take a cooking class tomorrow. We toured the city area and saw how the silk is make and woven which included seeing how they raise the silkworms right there in the shop.

Our hotel, Victoria Beach Resort and Spa (bed 8) is right on the beach and is very modern with a big western style bathroom, big king size bed and nice furniture. We have free WIFI here and a free shuttle into town. We were able to relax a little, took a walk on the beach and swam in the pool which overlooks the sea. We had a light dinner at the restaurant that Dien recommended. Dinner plus local beer was 106,000 dong including the tip which was $6.00 US. We are actually getting used to this currency.

We were surprised to find out that the chef at our hotel worked for the Colony on Longboat Key and lived in Bradenton 7 years ago. We had a nice talk with him. It really is a small world.