"I want to ride my bicycle. I want to ride my bike..."

Again, am fairly behind schedule in posting this as the tour is over now! Oh well, enjoy...

Treating ourselves to another gourmet breakfast at the Asia Hotel, we had to get ready to leave for our drive to Hoi An. I'd curbed the drinking the night before and only had a few so I didn't feel completely awful on the long journey.

I wasn't sure what to expect from Hoi An in comparison to the other cities but friends and family had certainly set the bar high by saying how much they loved it there, even claiming it was their favourite place.

We had a few stops on the way during the 4 hour drive seeing a beach view and a little pit stop at a high viewpoint which had some small stalls and toilet facilities. The high viewpoint had a couple who had just got married having their photos taken and I would have loved to take a few snaps of them but it would have felt intrusive so I just said hello to them instead! The rest of the journey whizzed past in a blur of sleep, music and daydreaming looking out the window.

As we were arriving into the city, Huyen told us about all the activities we would be doing including a bicycle tour, Oodles of Noodles lunch demonstration and the option of doing an additional cookery course which would be more traditional and include a market tour to look at all the fresh produce too. I really wanted to do that as I love cooking so signed up for it along with Stephanie, Lizzie and Cheryl.

We dropped our luggage off and checked into the Van Loi Hotel (it even had an outdoor pool!) and Huyen walked us to a cafe/restaurant for lunch. Banh Mi was on the menu - a famous baguette in Vietnam with pork, salad, egg and different seasoning however I chose the mixed one which had a bit of everything in it. He told us it was the best place in Hoi An to go for them and at 25,000 dong, they were not only great but dirt cheap too (not even a pound!)

There wasn't too much time after that for us as we had to be back at the hotel for 4pm to be collected for our cookery course but we managed to fit in a wander around by the harbour and through the market which was lovely. The atmosphere was so different to the other cities as it was quieter and had a much slower place; very chilled! Hoi An was the first place the French landed back in the day and you could definitely tell. The streets had a French look and feel with the architecture and design of the restaurants, bars and some of the hotels, especially along the harbour, so I felt it was quite colonial.

Next stop was the cookery course which was amazing! Hung our chef picked us up from the hotel and we took a taxi to browse around the market where he pointed out various fruit, vegetables, noodles, spices and meat he would use in traditional dishes. He also got us a deep fried banana wrapped in pancake to try which was a bit greasy but tasty!

After that, we walked to his restaurant, weaving in and out of the cars and mopeds as we went. The staff were so friendly and we had a really warm welcome. It was a large open air cooking area so we washed our hands and got prepped to get stuck in, having a nosy around whilst we waited for Hung to return from the main kitchen. On the menu was a traditional Vietnamese pancake, spring rolls, fish cooked in banana leaf and a chicken and papaya salad. Each dish was prepped and cooked and then we got to eat as we went so it didn't go cold! The fish took longer as it had to be put in the oven for about 20/25 mins so we prepped the chicken papaya salad whilst we waited. When the fish was served, Hung had also made an aubergine dish for us to enjoy. We had lots of fun making the dishes and the course was great fun to do - I'm looking forward to using the recipe booklet we were given so I can continue to enjoy the food when I get home!

Stephanie and I headed to the pool bar when we returned to the hotel to get a nice G&T on happy hour and played a couple of games of pool - I lost both times! Nathan and Ash then turned up so we chatted to them about their afternoon whilst they played a game and after that we played doubles; best of three. Ash and I didn't do too badly and I managed to pot 4 balls in one go but it went head to head on the black ball and we lost 2-1 - gutted!

The following morning, we got up early and had breakfast - hands down the worst one so far as there wasn't a lot of variety and was very bland! After that, it was an exciting day as we got to explore the city on a bicycle tour. Great fun but also one of the sweatiest days of my entire life; I just couldn't cool down! Our first stop was at a large veggie patch with a couple of famous farmers - the husband was 93, his wife was 86 and they'd been married for 70 years; the epitome of marriage goals! They still worked to maintain their crop and were literally the cutest pair. They became famous because a photographer that once visited took a photo of them which was published in a book on Vietnam and they also feature on postcards too! I got my photo taken with them and had to have an obligatory pose with their traditional watering cans.

Other stops were to ride the water buffalo (amazing fun!), the beach for a drink and ice cream (the lads were the only crazy cats to go near the water and got soaked!) and finally a boat trip with lots of fresh fruit and drinks where we could cool down a little bit as we headed back closer to the city centre.

We headed back to the hotel to get showered a dressed and then went for a lunchtime demonstration at Oodles of Noodles where the staff talked us through the different noodle varieties and we then got to make some of our own. The food was great - a pork noodle soup with chillies and quails egg (Mi Quang) and a round flat noodle that hadn't been shredded in between a large rice cracker that looked like a poppadom but was folded in half and smashed.

When that finished, we had free time for the afternoon and the next day until we needed to meet Huyen at reception in the evening to go out for dinner. We browsed around the shops and had a little wander along the harbour and streets, stopping off to cool down with a cheap beer overlooking the water. Finishing our little browse by heading through the market, we headed back to the hotel to drop off some laundry at a nearby shop, freshen up, have a nap and contact the outside world and let the family know I was still alive and kicking! In the late afternoon, we headed for the salon and I treated myself to a manicure and pedicure whilst Stephanie and Connie had full body massages. The massage part was lovely and it was super relaxing but the actual polish was an awful job and it smeared a couple of hours later (think they put too much thinner in it so it doesn't dry properly!)

By about 8pm, we were starting to get a little bit peckish so we headed out towards the night market leaving Connie in the salon finishing her pedicure. It has to be said, at night, Hoi An is something pretty spectacular with all the lanterns along the restaurants and shops and the lights on the bridges. I completely fell in love with all the lanterns at the market and only wished that I had room in my case to buy up a load but also a house to hang them up in! The other stalls were nice enough but the Vietnamese could learn a trick or two as each one was exactly the same so it didn't take long to look around. We'd just about finished looking around and the heavens opened with a torrential downpour and naturally we had no ponchos on us so ducked into a bar and ordered some food whilst we waited for Connie to meet us. I order a Mi Quang as I'd enjoyed it so much at lunch but it wasn't a touch on the one I'd had earlier and gave me an upset stomach later on instead!

After a rubbish night's sleep from the tummy cramps, I got up and went for breakfast, despite the fact it was the only day we could have had a lie-in. It was as awful as the day before but luckily I wasn't too hungry! We ventured out again for a closer inspection of the clothes shops to see if we could get any dresses or jumpsuits but I couldn't find anything that looked right on and some of them were really expensive. Connie, Stephanie and I did have a laugh trying them all on though as it was in the middle of the shop on a busy street along the harbour with just a flimsy and fairly see-through curtain to cover ourselves with. I bought myself a couple of bracelets and an anklet and was happy to get it for a reduced rate after some serious bartering. Because we really enjoyed the Oodles of Noodles food, we decided to go to the Streets restaurant and I had the same dish again - it was just too good!

Connie fancied a manicure and I needed to get mine re-done after the botch job from the previous day so in the afternoon we headed back to the salon. The owner was really sweet and made a fuss of us whenever she saw us walking past and even more so when we went in. That morning, she'd had the cutest puppy delivered which she'd named Lucky - it was adorable! The lady decided to re-do my toe nails as well as my finger nails without charging me so I sat back in the chair and got myself comfortable - she got me a cushion for behind my head too! Within minutes, I was out for the count and woke up about an hour or so later; result!

The girls were going back out to buy some lanterns but I still had a bit of a funny tummy and didn't fancy wandering any more in the heat so just stayed in the room and relaxed until dinner. We met at 7pm and Huyen took us to us to a restaurant serving street food where they rolled all the wraps for us made up of spring rolls, pickles, greens and pork - was really tasty and didn't take too long until I was completely stuffed!

Afterwards we wandered around the centre along the shops and took some photos and then went back to the hotel. It was ridiculously hot and I couldn't cool down so I left the girls at the bar and jumped into the pool for a swim which was glorious and so cold! I then went up to our room and packed, ready for our early start to catch the flight to Ho Chi Minh the following day.

Quote to leave you on for the day (Dr Seuss) - "You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself in any direction you choose. You're on your own and you know what you know. And you are the one who'll decide where to go..." xxx