The Shores of Quy Nhon City

Quy Nhon is a coastal city, developed in modern times, but Vietnamese to its bootstraps.  Western influences are few and far between because the overseas tourist have yet to disturb this place.  It reminds me of Vietnam 12 years ago - not much English, very few cars, lots of musty old shops and restaurants and hotels which really only cater for the locals.

Yet this place has lots of charm.  The city fronts a first class beach and is surrounded by mountains on one side and the sea on the other. There are no touts to bother you and the people are friendly.

This arvo we caught a taxi into town from Haven with Rosie and Huw and got taken for a bit of a Cook's tour (I'm not sure what the Vietnamese explorer equivalent is!).  One of the most fascinating parts was seeing the shipbuilding yards in the port area.  This is where the traditional timber fishing boats are made using a combination of what looked like traditional and modern methods.

We also spent some time exploring a couple more Cham towers, extremely well preserved and right in the heart of town.  The 20m high Thap Doi towers were built in the 12th century and have curved rather than terrace roofing, which is unusual in Cham architecture.  Dismembered torsos of the Hindu god Garuda (half human, half bird) grace the corners of each tower.  The heads have long since disappeared whether through decay or thievery.  On this coastal plain close to the sea, the towers would have had an impressive presence all those years ago.

We had dinner in a local Vietnamese restaurant where seafood dominated the menu - very common in Quy Nhon.  It was a struggle to get the beer and wine cold as locals prefer to keep it at room temperature and then add ice!  So we got some buckets and ice and insisted in keeping the drinks there while we slowly drank our first beer and waited for the rest to chill down.  We weren't too adventurous with the food but tried various renditions of shrimps, scallops and calamari.

The drive back to Haven was spectacular with all the night lights of Quy Nhon and the lobster fishing out to sea.

We finished the evening by breaking out the guitar and having a sing along, something Rosie and I used to do regularly years ago.  Plenty of Bob Dylan, Neil Young and lots of other folk oddities.  There isn't anything much better than making music in the company of friends with waves hitting the beach nearby and sea breezes on the night air.