– NOVEMBER 04-07, 2015
We boarded a night bus (a sleeper bus) to ride overnight to our next destination, Hoi An. There were seats that folded down and just enough space to get sort-of comfortable. There was nowhere to store any small bags (your large bags went under the bus of course), so you had to find a way to place your small bags (camera, laptop, etc) with you and still allow you to sleep.
We arrived in Hoi An at 7am and it was a very heavy rain storm. Jill reluctantly put on the plastic bag rain coat (she calls it a trash unit).
The city of Hoi An is beautiful and was a great stop on the trip.
The delicious banh mi sandwiches in Ho Chi Minh City can’t be beat, but that didn’t stop us from hitting the Hoi An famous banh mi booth named the “Banh Mi Queen“. I had the fully loaded sandwich and Jill had the vegetarian fried egg & cheese sandwich. They were definitely good, but not as good as the Ho Chi Ming City favorites. However, at $1 Cdn each sandwich we came back here every day on this stay.
The best part of the Banh Mi Queen was a restaurant that served draft beer for 33 cents Cdn a glass was just calling our names!
Hoi An is famous for the custom clothing tailors…and we definitely took advantage of this. During our stay in Hoi An we went to A Dong Silk (who had the best reviews on the internet) and got measured up for some custom suits and jackets.

A Dong Silk Custom Tailors – Jill really got into sitting with the salespeople to explain her design intent to the clothing. She easily could have been a clothing designer.

A Dong Silk Custom Tailors – Jill really got into sitting with the salespeople to explain her design intent to the clothing. She easily could have been a clothing designer.

A Dong Silk Custom Tailors – There was a little dude getting a suit done and it was a neat sight to see.
Then we went to Trang Tri custom shoes and bags (also well reviewed) and I got one leather bag and a new pair of custom sandals; while Jill got six designer bags and a couple of pairs of shoes. We aren’t showing everything in this blog, as Jill wants to surprise some people with her custom designs when we get back to the real world.

Trang Tri Custom Shoes and Bags – Jill explained to the tailors how her custom designs related to various examples.

Trang Tri Custom Shoes and Bags – Upstairs Jill went through the multiple material samples to pull her design intent into reality.

Trang Tri Custom Shoes and Bags – Upstairs Jill went through the multiple material samples to pull her design intent into reality.

Trang Tri Custom Shoes and Bags – Upstairs Jill went through the multiple material samples to pull her design intent into reality.

Trang Tri Custom Shoes and Bags – This is the final product for my work bag. Custom pockets to hold a computer, files, drawings, and stationary.
Custom clothing done in a top notch professional manner for a fraction of the price we would find in Canada. This was a slam-dunk and a no-brainer…we will look good in 2016 when we get back to Vancouver in the real world.
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For more photos of our adventure go to our flickr account here.