Tours in the City of Hoi An and Its Surroundings
The city of Hoi An is located in central Vietnam on the coast, about thirty kilometers southeast of the city of Da Nang, which you can find detailed in my article: Tours in the City of Da Nang and Its Surroundings. Hoi An is a charming, preserved, and colorful port city with ancient buildings from hundreds of years ago. Colorful spherical street lanterns throughout the old city create a festive atmosphere for travelers there.
On the river, many boats sail with tourists, and they too are illuminated in the evening with colorful lanterns and candles.
In the heart of the old city stands an ancient Japanese bridge leading to the Japanese side of the city, where it is worth visiting a typical authentic Japanese house.
♦ Recommended tours in the city of Hoi An and its surroundings (to book via Viator):
The ancient Japanese bridge, which also appears on the 20,000 Dong banknote:
The city sometimes suffers from flooding during the rainy season, and on the floor of the second story of the houses, they left a wide opening which was used to raise belongings to the upper floor in case of floods.
In the center of the old city, you can visit the Folklore Museum, a Chinese temple, and also
a typical Vietnamese house.
It is fun to stroll through the old city in the evening among a variety of shops, restaurants, cafes, and many stalls,
and enjoy the abundance of twinkling lights, good food, and vibrant atmosphere.
Recommended accommodations in Hoi An
Four Seasons The Nam Hai, Hoi An
The most luxurious hotel in Hoi An. A deluxe 5-star resort. The hotel features spacious villas with one bedroom, two bedrooms, and three bedrooms.
Some of the villas have private pools. Some of the villas are located right on the beach. The resort features 3 swimming pools, tennis and basketball courts, a spa, restaurants, a bar, and a kids' club.
Sunrise Premium Resort Hoi An
A 5-star beachfront resort. The hotel features 2 swimming pools overlooking the beach, a fitness room, a spa, restaurants, and a bar.
Palm Garden Beach Resort & Spa
A 5-star beachfront resort spread over a wide area. Accommodations are in spacious and well-equipped bungalows. Some are close to the beach and some are in landscaped gardens. Attractive prices. The hotel features a pool, spa, restaurant, and bar.
Palm Garden Beach Resort hotel:
Laluna Hoi An Riverside Hotel & Spa
A 4-star hotel five minutes away from Hoi An's old city, near the river.
The hotel features a swimming pool, spa, fitness room, and restaurant.
Lasenta Boutique Hotel Hoian
A 4-star boutique hotel one kilometer from the old city.
The hotel features a pool, fitness room, spa, bar, and restaurant.
Food Tour in the City of Hoi An:
It is recommended to take a food tour of the city's stalls where you will taste an interesting variety of local dishes: a famous sandwich in Vietnam called Banh Mi, whose bread is a Vietnamese-style French baguette – softer and fluffier than the French one, filled with a variety of foods of your choice, an omelet with vegetables, meat with vegetables, delicious sauces, and more. The old city of Vietnam has the most delicious Banh Mi in the country!
Another delicious dish is White Rose, which are rice sheets filled with your choice of chopped shrimp, onion, and garlic or another filling, served with a small dish of dipping sauce. This is a dish typical of central Vietnam. Other dishes: the well-known banana roti from Thailand which is a fried crepe with a banana filling and sweet sauce on top, chicken rice, spring rolls in a delicious sauce, and more. The tour also passes through the market of the old city.
Short video about a trip to the old city of Hoi An:
Bicycle trip to a village outside the city
The area around the city is flat, so it is easy and worthwhile to take a bike trip outside the city. You pedal through vast picturesque rice fields and occasionally see water buffalos in the fields.
An easy and diverse trip is to a spice farm where they demonstrate and experience planting crops in the field, including preparing a garden bed with an algae bed, and practicing watering the crops using two buckets with a funnel on the shoulders as done according to the ancient tradition passed down from generation to generation.
The tour includes lunch where you also experience cooking a local omelet with shrimp, chicken, and bean sprouts.
Guests soak their feet at the end of the meal in a tub of water with lemongrass to refresh and soothe their feet.
You can also visit a silk manufacturing factory where you see the stages of raising caterpillars and cocoons, extracting threads from the cocoons, and fabric and clothing production. You can also buy silk clothing on-site.
Another place to visit is a pottery village where they demonstrate making clay bowls and you can also try it yourself.
Short video about the bicycle trip near Hoi An:
Visit to the Duy Hai Fish Market
To see the fishermen returning early in the morning from a night of fishing and selling their catch on the pier, you must wake up early in the morning at 5:00 AM and sail by boat to the fishing village.
In this village, near the pier, family members (mostly women) wait for the fishermen to receive and handle the catch, clean, sort, fill crates and baskets, weigh, and sell the fish.
On the pier, you see crates and baskets with fish of many species and sizes, crabs, clams, and eels. There is a lot of hustle and bustle, both on the pier and in the water near it, where fishing boats come and go. Here you also see the extensive use fishermen make of round bamboo basket boats. They mainly sail in them from the anchored boats to the pier and back. In these baskets, they also use for fishing, spreading and collecting nets or traps.
In this market, almost no tourists are seen, so the visit is completely authentic and interesting.
The fishing pier is located in the Duy Hai fishing village, which is located southeast of Hoi An across the river, where the Duy Hai ferry pier is also located.
Those interested can also reach this pier by car by driving over the large bridge crossing the river, which is 15 minutes away from Hoi An (about 8 km).
Day bicycle tour of various attractions
On this bicycle tour, you ride between villages and fields and also take a short boat ride between destinations along with the bicycles. You ride through rice fields and visit a fishing village. You see various artisans at work: carpet weaving, wood carving decorated with seashells, various woodworking, and boat building.
Among other things, you accompany a couple of fishermen and try fishing with a net thrown into the water like a fan.
You learn about the customs of the fishermen who keep dolphin and whale bones inside a ship-shaped temple close to the water.
The main food of the local residents is rice in its various forms, and on this tour, you also experience making rice noodles.
Basket Boats
In this area, the use of basket boats is common. These are round boats about two meters in diameter made of woven bamboo strips coated with a sealant (layers of cow dung (!) and tree resin). These boats are used to transport equipment and people from the shore to the boats and sometimes also used for spreading fishing nets.
Crab fishing among palm branches with a basket boat:
The locals found another new and entertaining use for these boats. Since these round boats look weird and amusing, tourists (especially Koreans) love to go for a ride in these boats, and indeed you can sometimes watch a large group of tourists having fun inside these boats while listening to music from large, loud speakers.
Short video about various attractions near Hoi An:
Trip to Ba Na Hills
The Ba Na Hills site by Sun World is located in the mountains about twenty kilometers west of Da Nang. The site is famous mainly because of the golden viewpoint bridge with the giant hands holding it, but this site is a complex of amusement, entertainment, viewpoints, restaurants, and hotels by Sun World and is considered one of the best resorts in Vietnam.
A detailed description of the Ba Na Hills site in the article: Tours in the City of Da Nang and Its Surroundings
Tours to Da Nang, My Son Antiquities, and the Marble Mountains
It is also recommended to tour the nearby city of Da Nang (located 30 km from Hoi An), the My Son antiquities, and the Marble Mountains near Da Nang. You will also find details about all of these in my article: Tours in the City of Da Nang and Its Surroundings