4D3N – 4 Days 3 Nights
While I was studying abroad in Korea, I managed to find some free time in my schedule to take a quick 4-day vacation to Vietnam! I had only been to southeast Asia once before, around 4 years ago when I visited Thailand and Singapore. I had heard so many good things about Vietnam that I knew I wanted to go there when I visited the region next!
I had two main objectives for my trip:
- To visit one of the two major cities (Hanoi in the north, Ho Chi Minh City in the south)
- To get custom clothing made by Vietnam’s world-famous professional, affordable tailors. The area renowned for its customized tailoring is Hoi An, a small town located in the center of the country.
I decided to go first to this area and then make my way to Hanoi before coming back to Korea. I chose Hanoi because it is more of a historical city compared to Ho Chi Minh, and I thought it would be a nice break from the modernity of Seoul.
I started my journey with my flight into Da Nang, a midsized city about a 30 minute drive away from Hoi An. There is no airport in Hoi An because it is such a small town, so Da Nang is the closest option.
Keep in mind that for many visitors, including Americans, you must acquire an e-visa to enter Vietnam. It is a relatively quick and easy process but you must plan to do it in advance to prevent problems at airport immigration and customs. The process involves giving personal information commonly found on passports, as well as a portrait-style photo for identification.
You must also input your entry and exit ports to the country, so make sure you are certain which cities you are flying into and out of! Finally, visitors must pay a $25 application fee to obtain the visa. I thought this was a pretty fair deal considering how affordable the country is and the higher cost of other visas worldwide.
I arrived in Da Nang around midnight, and my Airbnb host was gracious enough to send my friends and I a personal driver to bring us to our residence, where the host greeted us in the building’s lobby! I was so surprised the host had stayed up so late to greet us personally, but I appreciated his help with registering us with the reception area of the building and giving us a tour of our apartment!
The Airbnb was located in an apartment building that was one of the tallest buildings in the entire city. The accommodation itself was beautiful – well kept and spacious with living room, kitchen, 2 bedrooms and bathrooms, and a balcony! The view from the balcony was incredible – we could see the entire rest of the city as well as the nearby ocean and beaches.
The driver also gave us his number before dropping us off in case we would need him to get to other destinations in the area in the following days – everyone we interacted with so far made us feel so welcome and it was a great first experience when entering the country!
The next morning I woke up excited to travel to Hoi An and get my tailored clothes! For breakfast we stopped by a small local grocery store and got some baked goods and fruit. There were a bunch of these grocery stores within a block of the Airbnb which was super convenient.
We then called our driver from the previous night and asked him to drive us to Hoi An. He was super helpful and picked us up within 15 minutes. On the drive, he asked us if we were getting clothes tailored and if we had a specific place in mind. We said we didn’t and he said he could take us to his friend’s shop and could get us a discount!
We agreed and headed to Thương Tailor Cloth Shop, where we were greeted by a lovely tailor and her small child, who was home from school on lunch break. Our tailor was very patient in helping us decide on the styles and fabrics we wanted, and had multiple idea books and numerous samples for us to try.
I ended up deciding on a three-piece gray suit and a tube top. My friends all got suits as well. She measured us one by one as we played hide and seek with her kid 😂. She then helped us pick out patterns, linings, and accessories such as pocket squares and ties to match with our clothes.
After finalizing measurements and designs, we told her about our plans to travel to Hanoi the next night. She was incredibly accommodating and said she would leave our suits with our driver for when we come back to Da Nang for our flight back to Korea!
She also recommended a lunch spot, Banh Mi Sum, which we went to after she finished the measurements. The banh mis there were fresh and tasty, and the restaurant had ample seating. The tables also had a sweet chile hot sauce that tasted amazing on the Banh Mi!
After loving the banh mi, we decided to try out our tailor’s other lunch recommendation, Quán Cao lầu Bá Lễ, where we got pork noodle bowls. There, our server suggested we try out the coconut boats while we were in Hoi An for the day.
Coconut boats are a popular tourist attraction in Hoi An, where a sailor with a long paddle can take up to two people at a time down a slow, winding river in circular boats that resemble coconuts. There are multiple venues that offer this experience, and you will see some with negative reviews online, which is why it may be best to have someone you trust take you to the proper place.
And that’s exactly what we did! We asked our driver to take us to the location recommended by the restaurant server and had a great experience! Rafting down the river was super relaxing and our boat captains and other tourists made the experience fun and exciting! We were able to join in paddling down the river, and can even tip other boat captains to spin us in circles inside the boat using their paddles!
I highly recommend experiencing the spinning if you don’t get nauseous too easily – the force generated is enough to push you overboard so make sure you hang on tight to the edge of the boat!
After our boating expedition, our driver dropped us back downtown for the rest of the day, where we roamed the streets looking at museums and historical places like the Fujian Assembly Hall. Along the way we stopped by various street vendors selling everything from tote bags and backpacks to jackets, t-shirts and jerseys! I picked up a sweet Real Madrid jersey and this cute North Face backpack! It has so much storage space!
We then walked by the tailor shop to say hello again before rounding the corner to get banh mi for dinner at Madam Khanh – The Banh Mi Queen. The banh mi here was just as good as the previous place but the style and ingredients were a little different. I appreciated this because it felt like each banh mi spot has its own unique flavor or twist on the dish.
After dinner, we walked over the Japanese Covered Bridge to go to the Hoi An Night Market, where we found tons of street vendors selling fruit, souvenirs, jewelry and more! I went and bought this cute little capybara, he has a tail that spins when you pull on his string! I named him Moht Moht, because moht (one) is the first Vietnamese word I learned how to say!
After enjoying our time at the night market and fueling my capy obsession, we called our driver and went back to Da Nang to our Airbnb. We also made sure to pay our driver although he wouldn’t allow us to tip him past the agreed upon rate 😣- so sweet and humble. The entire day’s worth of driving came out to around $15 per person – well worth it for the convenience, familiarity and friendship we had built with our driver.
The next day, we had some time to spend in Da Nang before our afternoon flight to Hanoi. We once again ate food from the grocery for breakfast and called our driver. When he picked us up, we asked him for recommendations on how to spend our morning. We were stuck between Ba Na Hills, a tourist destination in the nearby mountains, or the Marble Mountains, a collection of caves and hiking trails in a mountain range closer to the city.
The driver suggested the Marble Mountains as we were on a limited time frame and it would be both less crowded and closer to the city and airport. Right outside of the entrance to the mountains were tons of marble shops selling sculptures ranging from the size of my hand to my entire body! Some were super cool and intricate but I wondered if any foreigners actually bought these items since they must be so difficult to bring back to their home country!
We walked up a staircase carved into the side of the mountain and then through a series of caves, which took us in and out of the various hills. In the middle of the complex was a small courtyard with a food stall and bathrooms, as well as signs guiding visitors along various different paths. One path took us down into a massive cavern with exceptionally high ceilings! There were three holes in the ceiling resembling the shape of a skull, and you can see water drip slowly down from the top onto us.
We exited the area by taking a path that brought us to the top of the mountain, giving us a view of the surrounding city. It was even better than the view from our apartment! After our hike, we ate lunch at a nearby restaurant and then called our driver to take us to the airport. The Da Nang airport is small but is pretty well maintained and we checked in relatively quickly.
After a quick one hour flight, we arrived in Hanoi. We got a Grab (southeast Asia’s Uber) from the airport to our Airbnb – which was close to the Old Quarter and Hoàn Kiếm Lake. Our Airbnb was TrangTien Hostel and our room was located on the third floor.
It was a bit difficult to get our bags up the narrow staircase, but our room itself was incredibly spacious with a beautiful bathroom and small kitchen area along with two sizable rooms! After checking in, we walked over to Bún chả Hương Liên for dinner.
This restaurant is known for its bun cha – which is a dish originating from Hanoi that consists of grilled pork, seasoned pork patties, fresh vegetables like lettuce and carrots, vermicelli noodles and a sweet savory dipping sauce. It is unique because the noodles come separate from the dipping sauce, and you can add the noodles to the sauce as you please to eat with the meat and vegetables.
This specific restaurant is famous because former President Obama ate there when he visited Vietnam in 2016 – the menu even has a combo special featuring exactly the items that Obama ordered! The combo includes one order of bun cha, a fried seafood roll, and a Hanoi Beer for around $5!
The meal was absolutely delicious and was unlike any other Vietnamese food I’ve had in the US. The restaurant servers were incredibly kind to us, letting us stay past the official closing time since we got there only 15 minutes before closing.
After dinner, we went for a nighttime stroll along the lake to digest and explore the city for a bit before turning it in for the night.
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The next day, we got breakfast at a restaurant located in an alleyway around the corner from the Airbnb. Called Cơm Trắng Quán, it was a cute little spot with low tables and a small menu. I ended up getting fried rice with egg and roast pork and it was yummy and filling – a great start to the day!
We then walked a short distance over to the Vietnamese Women’s Museum and Hoa Lo Prison – two interesting history museums that offered a look at what life was like in Vietnam decades ago.
Afterwards we grabbed a Grab (hehe) to Tran Quoc Pagoda – a beautiful buddhist temple located on a little peninsula in the enormous West Lake (Hồ Tây). Be advised that there were signs stating that modest clothing should be worn when entering the temple area – meaning no crop tops or anything that shows your shoulders.
After exploring the colorful pagoda and its beautiful views of the lake and city, we walked over to Ho Chi Minh’s Mausoleum. The mausoleum is located inside a government compound that is strictly guarded by soldiers.
Both entrances (we entered from the North) have a metal detector station to prevent anyone from bringing contraband onto the compound grounds, and high quality cameras were not allowed as well. I almost didn’t get let in because of my 360° camera but the guards were kind enough to let me through once I promised not to use it.
The government compound also has a modest clothing policy, and this one was much more strictly enforced than at the pagoda. Once again, anything showing your shoulders or midriff was not allowed, and any shorts or skirts were also not allowed. In front of me, an Australian tourist was turned away for wearing khaki shorts, but I understand that its a gesture of respect to Ho Chi Minh and the government to wear more formal attire when visiting the area.
The compound was a massive concrete plaza with beautiful, colorful government buildings on all sides – although I don’t have pictures because no photography of these buildings were allowed for safety reasons. If you search the Vietnamese Presidential Palace online though, you can see an example of what I was able to see.
As we walked south, we passed by the mausoleum which looked extra cool in the shadow of the sun. We also passed by groups of soldiers marching through the plaza, dressed in fashionable all-white uniforms.
As we exited the compound, we walked by the imposing Ho Chi Minh Museum. We wanted to go inside but it was temporarily closed, so I guess I’ll have to see it during my next visit! We then walked over to the Imperial Citadel of Thang Long, which had a lovely garden and monument to explore, while once again exposing us to some more Hanoi history.
We then walked over to Hong Hoai’s Restaurant where we had what the server called “dry bun cha”. It consisted of seasoned grilled pork on a bed of fresh vegetables, along with rice paper to wrap all the ingredients into little rolls to eat. It was fresh, delicious, and fun as we dipped our rice papers in water to soften them and made our own rolls!
After our meal, we went to the famous Hanoi Train Street (Phố Đường Tàu Hà Nội). There are multiple locations where you can view the train as it passes by, and we chose the one with the more frequent train arrivals. The arrivals can be found online and vary by day, usually coming in 1 or 2 hour intervals in the afternoon and early evening, which is probably the most popular time to view the train.
There are many restaurants and bars lining the tracks, and many of them have multiple floors of seating! You can either sit on the ground level right next to the tracks or spring for balcony seating for a higher view of the train. We sprung for the ground level seats and ordered some beers as we waiting for the train to come.
The prices here are a little higher than other restaurants but it is still very affordable and worth it if you want to see the train up close! Our waitress was also very kind and made sure our seats stayed a safe distance from the tracks. In general, all the restaurant workers prioritized safety and made sure the tracks were clear well in advance of the train’s arrival.
Many servers, including our own, placed our beer caps on the train tracks, so that when the train passed by, it left behind flattened caps as souvenirs! After the train left, we went for a walk down the tracks to explore the rest of the shops along the way. We then continued to walk through the Old Quarter.
We walked by the crowded Ta Hien Beer Street but didn’t buy anything as we just drank at the train street. We then decided to try some indian food at a local restaurant. The butter chicken was pretty tasty until… I had an allergy attack. I wasn’t sure at first if it was the dairy in the curry, but I realized that with the severity of my reaction, there had to have been nuts in the dish.
I googled butter chicken recipes and realized that sometimes the dish is made with cashews, which I am highly allergic to. I waved over the host/manager and asked him if there were nuts in the butter chicken that was causing my attack. He insisted that the restaurant’s recipe contained no nuts, but as we walked away a waitress came over and nodded to us – telling us there was nuts in it.
We brought the manager over five minutes later and asked him again, referencing a waiter who told us otherwise without signaling her out, but he still told us there were no nuts. I was getting annoyed so we just paid our bill and went home for the night, where I took a benadryl and kept an eye on my symptoms for a little longer.
Thankfully my symptoms gradually got better and I was able to get myself comfortable to sleep for a few hours without needing to use my epipen or go to the emergency room. After that experience though, I was extremely cautious about what I ate the rest of the trip.
The next day we could only spend the morning and a bit of the afternoon in Hanoi before flying back to Da Nang to pick up our tailored clothes and catch our return flight to Korea. We started the day by walking along Hoàn Kiếm Lake and visited The Note Coffee, an incredibly sweet and beautiful cafe known for giving customers sticky notes with their purchase to write messages on and post all over the cafe.
The cafe was multiple stories tall and sticky notes covered almost every square inch besides the chairs. The walls, staircase, ceiling, tables and more were all completely colored in colorful notes. The contents of the notes ranged from silly jokes to people’s signatures and dates, to motivational phrases and words of encouragement. It was honestly so sweet to see so much positive energy coming from the notes and it made us feel like we were a part of something larger than ourselves when writing our own.
After we wrote our notes, we decided to place them in a nook behind a window where not a lot of notes were, hoping that our notes wouldn’t be replaced since they were in a hard to reach place. The notes were private so we cared less about the public seeing them and more about preserving the memory. The staff told us that they sift through the notes and consistently remove them every 2 years based on marked dates – so I guess I’ll have to go to Vietnam again soon to see my note again!
As for the actual drinks at the cafe, it had pretty good Vietnamese coffee (like every other place we went to so far lol). After enjoying our drink and having fun reading strangers’ notes, we walked around and did some more shopping. We stopped by Master Tan, a herbal shop to get some unique teas, as well as a photo booth to take some pictures to remember our trip!
We then ate some lunch at Bun Cha Ta Hanoi, where we had our favorite meal, bun cha, as our last meal in Hanoi. The bun cha here was also really delicious and tasted a little differently from the first place we went to, and they gave us more vegetables which added to the freshness of the dish.
After lunch, we got a Grab back to the airport. Quick reminder – on the Grab app you can get either a car or a bike to carry you around. We wanted to try the bike as the streets of Hanoi were filled with them and it looked fun, but we were a group of 4 so we would have to get 4 bikes to get around. It was easier to just get a car, but if you are traveling solo or in smaller group, consider getting a bike as a cheaper and more exciting option!
The Hanoi airport is a bit bigger than the one in Da Nang and a little more chaotic, but it was still relatively easy to navigate and had good amenities. Our flight arrived on time and we got back to Da Nang quickly. It is worth noting that there are a few major airlines in Vietnam. The ones we learned about and came into contact with were Vietnam Airlines, VietJet, and Vietravel Airlines.
We booked our flights between Da Nang and Hanoi with VietJet, which is Vietnam’s primary low-cost carrier. We read online that they usually have delay problems and were a bit worried about making our flight back to Korea but all of our VietJet flights arrived on time, although we may have just been lucky. Vietnam Airlines is the national carrier and is generally considered the most well-run, on-time quality airline, but their tickets were relatively more expensive so we took the risk with VietJet.
During our search, we also found similarly priced flights to VietJet from a carrier called Vietravel and were considering booking one of our flights through them, but a helpful waiter at The Note Coffee told us that Vietravel is kind of a travel company that only recently started their airline division, so they might not be the most reliable currently. He convinced us to stay with VietJet and the decision worked out for us!
What you decide to take depends entirely on your budget and time frames, but keep in mind Vietnam Airlines has the most extensive network with the most domestic international flights as well, if you are planning on flying to a smaller city or perhaps abroad.
When we arrived in Da Nang, our previous driver picked us up from the airport and drove us to Dragon Bridge – which is exactly what it sounds like! Its a bridge shaped like a dragon that spews fire and water every weekend night at 9pm. We were able to get a view of the action on the riverside, where there were tons of vendors with chairs and stalls selling drinks and snacks.
After seeing the show, we ate a quick dinner at Bánh Xèo Bà Dưỡng, which is known for its banh xeo, or vietnamese pancakes. The restaurant was nestled in the back of an alleyway and was about to close, but we were still graciously invited inside. The dining room was spacious and the food was very fresh. We got the pancakes and grilled meat skewers, and the servers and cooks were very respondent to allergy concerns since some items may contain nuts or seafood.
The meal was also served with lots of fresh vegetables, which was a perfect compliment to the meats. After dinner, our driver brought us back to the airport for our flight back to Korea. He also gave us the handwrapped clothing he picked up from the tailor. We thanked him so much for all the help he gave us during our trip, and were super thankful that he accepted a little extra tip from us this time :)). We still have his number so if I ever go back to Da Nang I will be sure to contact him again!
Overall it was a near perfect end to the night – but after we checked into the airport, we realized that our Air Seoul flight was delayed by 2 hours. After waiting for another hour, it was delayed for ANOTHER two hours. We didn’t end up boarding our flight until 3am – meaning we got back to Seoul in the late morning.
Despite the delay, we were on such a high from our incredible vacation that we remained unbothered, mostly just focusing on catching up on schoolwork during the extra airport time. By the time we reached Korea, I was glad to be home in the familiarity of Sinchon, but I continue to look forward to my next trip to Vietnam :)).
Joanne's Journey 