By Anthony Dylan Anak Frankie Jurem
In the first quarter of this year, I travelled quite a bit. I first went around the east coast of the Peninsula traversing through Kuantan and the coastal roads passing by Chukai, Kemaman, Kertih and ended in Kuala Terengganu. Weeks later, with the waves still high, I took a trip to Pulau Redang.
In March, I went on a family trip to central Vietnam. This was also the first time I took a tour during the season of Lent (40 days before Easter). This was the time I would normally abstain from meat, fish and eggs. We took a 5-day 4-night tour and flew in with Malaysia Airlines. We arrived before 530am as the flight was at 855am. There were 21 of us on the tour. A good size.
The flight took us just over 2.5 hours and we quickly went onto the bus to start the tour. We began the tour with a visit to the Danang Museum of Cha sculpture. This museum has the world’s largest collection of Cham artefacts and was founded in 1910. We then proceeded to have lunch at Pho Van Ha Noi. As I could not take chicken or beef pho, they created a vegetarian version with lots of yau char kway. It was good too.
We then went to Marble Mountains. Marble Mountains are a group of five limestone peaks. The five karsts (called Ngu Hanh Son in Vietnamese) are named after the five elements: Kim (metal), Thuy (water), Moc (wood), Hoa (fire) and Tho (earth). We went to Thuy Son, the water element peak. The views above were spectacular as you could see the whole of Danang as well as the long seashore line. The glass elevators added to the mesmerizing travel up and down the mountain. After a brief stop at a marble factor highlighting beautiful white marble sculptures, we then started our journey to Hoi An.
Hoi An was declared a world heritage site by UNESCO in 1999. We arrived in the late afternoon with clear blue skies. The ancient town was incredibly beautiful during the day and come nightfall, it became even more nostalgic with the crowds starting to come in and the lights strung across the streets along with lanterns further cemented the feeling.
We walked on both sides of the Huoai River, and we also managed to walk through the market or Cho in Vietnamese. As sunset came, the night market started to set up and some had already begun trading. The ancient town of Hoi An was truly a picturesque place to come to soak into the culture and social life of the town and her people. Everyone was polite and eager to assist without being intrusive or hard selling.
Dinner was at a hot pot BBQ place, Hoi An Hoa Restaurant. The buffet restaurant had a broad selection of meats and seafood and whilst the rest of the tour participants indulged in them, I got a good vegetarian one as well. We ended the day with our first hotel stay at Eco Lux Riverside Hotel. As the bus could not enter the small road leading to the lobby, we were all ferried by golf carts passing by paddy fields.
We began our second day with a drive to Cam Thanh Coconut Village. There, we took the Thung Chai or woven basket boat. Some call it the coconut boat. Maybe they were referring to the shape. The Thung chai is an iconic hemispherical boat made of woven bamboo. We passed through the mangrove of Nipah palms. They also call it coconut palms there. Hence, the coconut village name.
At the mouth of the river heading to sea, the boatman would spin the boat a bit for a thrill. We were also entertained by a boatman showcasing his boat spinning skills to the beat of music. Yes, the choice of song was …” Gangnam Style’! On the way to and back, as the tour guides knew we were from Malaysia, they shouted, “Malaysia Boleh” at intervals and serenaded us with Cantonese classics and Malay songs. Now that is really personalisation by the Vietnamese. They have really put effort into tourism.
After lunch at Bee Garden Restaurant, we then went back to Danang for a tour of the city. We visited the Pink Façade Danang Catholic Cathedral, Han Market (Cho Han, which is popular with the Koreans), the dragon bridge and the Son Tra Peninsula. The Linh Ung Pagoda here is one of the three in Danang. The other two are in the Marble Mountains and Bana Hills, respectively. The Lady Buddha could be majestically seen from My Khe Beach and Danang city. After a stroll through Son Tra night market and dinner at Nha Hang Dana Buffet Hot Pot, we checked into Magnolia Hotel for the night.
Our third day was in Bana Hills. We rode the world’s longest single-rope cable car in the world with a length of 5,771.61m. The Guinness Book of World Records certified this. The ride into the clouds was breathtaking. The same could be said with the time spent at Bana Hills. Truly, this place even beats Genting Highlands anytime in terms of planning, development, marketing and management. Even the buffet was part of the entrance ticket, and the offerings were aplenty! After a tiring day out a picture on the famous hands, we left Bana Hills, and our dinner was at Banana Flower restaurant as we made our way towards Hue. We checked in at Park View Hotel for the night.
On the fourth day, we were at Hue. Our day began at the Imperial City of Hue. This was the cultural, political and religious epicenter of the Nguyen Dynasty. An expansive property and a museum visit capped the trip. We then went to Perfume River and walked up to Thien Mu Pagoda which is the tallest stupa in Vietnam. We ended the day with a dragon boat cruise within the perfume river and headed back to Danang. Along the way, we stopped at an incense making village before we had dinner at Hai San Vi Dieu BBQ. Magnolia Hotel would be our last hotel for the night.
We headed back home on the fifth day and to be honest, Vietnam has really been a beautiful experience. In my opinion, we should visit countries like Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia more instead of Thailand which is overrated and getting rather commercialised.
