Our travel morning to Vietnam began early as we needed to take the metro for about an hour and a half to get to the airport. Thankfully we beat most of the morning rush hour and had only one transfer stop. Once bags were checked and transferred to the terminal, it was off to find some breakfast. They surprisingly had a Jamba Juice and their menu said they had smoothie bowls so I was excited to have something healthy for breakfast. We noticed in Korea most of their coffee and fast food places you could only order through kiosks. Unfortunately, they weren’t making any smoothie bowls that morning so it was off to a Paris themed cafe for some coffee and a pastry which didn’t really satisfy us. On the way there we also saw the first Taco Bell we’ve yet seen anywhere outside of the US. Grant grabbed some donut holes from Dunkin’ to eat before it was time to board.

Upon landing in Vietnam, we were greeted with sun and 85 degrees. I was thankful we could take off our coats from South Korea and enjoy some time in shorts and sandals. In the airport we noticed no one was really wearing their mask so it was nice to be free of it! Getting through customs and grabbing our bags was a breeze. The fun began when we got outside. We headed towards the currency exchange and immediately got approached by two different companies trying to get us to exchange there. Grant asked who had the best price to put them against each other and we went with the best one. It was kind of nice in Korea to not get heckled or approached by people to use them.

Grant had read that there were only a few taxi companies that didn’t try to cheat you so we initially tried to find the specific company before ending up using their ride share app, Grab. Even while waiting for our driver to come we still got approached by people saying they could give us rides for better price. Our driver finally arrived and it was off to check into the Airbnb. I got my first taste of what the traffic was like in Da Nang. The roundabouts are crazy! It’s not like the US where people yield to oncoming cars. They just head into the roundabout and slowly make their way around. But when you’re in the car it looks like you’re going to get into a wreck with someone. It seems in Vietnam the goal on the road is to constantly be moving no matter what!

When we arrived at the Airbnb, we were told to check in with the receptionist who looked more like a guard. He didn’t really speak much English but told us to wait while our host headed to the lobby. She also spoke very little English but was able to use google translate to help with any comments she needed to tell us. I felt bad because she grabbed my heavy bag and headed to the elevator to take us to the apartment on the 39th floor. She showed us around the apartment (which was mostly just pantomiming and pointing to various things) before we were left to enjoy the view from our balcony.

After unpacking and getting settled, we headed down to the beach to walk around. We grabbed a smoothie and some fries at a beach spot, dropped our jaws at how cheap they were, and enjoyed the nice ocean breeze blowing through. We could instantly tell there were more Westerners here than there were in Seoul this time of year, which surprised us. We even saw a public dance party filled with mostly westerners and some locals called “Dork Dancing for Mental Health.” Upon googling to try to remember the name, we discovered it’s an entire movement on YouTube. Needless to say we were caught off guard when one of the first things we saw in Vietnam was the street corner from the linked YouTube video blasting this song! The people watching was amazing – in particular an older Vietnamese man sitting on his parked motorbike with mouth wide open watching the group.

We continued our walk down the strand and noticed a lot of their restaurants here are like aquariums, except that people choose their seafood from these tanks. I like seafood but that seemed a little too weird for me to try. We ended up at East West Brewery hoping to grab some dinner but ended up just grabbing a drink and some fries (again, whoops) since the menu wasn’t too appealing to us.

On our way back to the apartment, we stopped by a local mini mart to grab some snacks. We talked to a Vietnamese man from Ho Chi Minh City also on vacation and asked about what snake-scale looking fruit was. He said he didn’t really know but his girlfriend loved it and gave us two to try. Turns out it’s popular in Indonesia. Grant wasn’t a fan of it and said it tasted like a bland apple, but I finished the whole thing. But we ended up leaving the grocery store with a whole sackful that only cost $26 USD. Our box of granola bars from Australia was the most expensive and cost half of what we paid for everything.