We had a week in Hoi An at the end of our Cambodia and Vietnam trip and I wasn’t sure if we should stay in the Old Town, close to the beach or in the middle of both – all have pro’s and con’s and it’s really a personal preference. I researched lots of different accommodation options even considered a few nights in each location but after enjoying Evie from Mum Pack Travel’s social media posts about her long-term accommodation in Hoi An at the Botanic Garden Homestay we decided to give this a go. I booked our accommodation directly.
Gorgeous entrance
Botanic Garden Homestay was established in 2012 and is a family run business who love sharing their culture and lifestyle with guests. The accommodation is built around the garden which is beautiful and well cared for – obviously with love. We had 7 nights here and we really felt like this was a lovely amount of time to explore Hoi An.
All the villas are named after tropical plants which are found throughout the gardens. Our villa was ‘Jasmine’ which was a 2-bedroom, 2-bathroom villa, which gave us ample room to unpack and settle in for the week. The villa also had a lovely lounge area and a ‘kitchen’. Well, I say a kitchen but it wasn’t really. It was a large kitchen style room with cupboards and a sink and a fridge with pots and pans but there were no cooking facilities (not that we were planning on cooking). There was even a clothes line out the back which was awesome for wet bathers and towels.
The villa was situated right next to the little swimming pool which the kids absolutely loved. It was small with a great shallow end for the kids, but the deep end was plenty deep enough for jumping in and swimming. There was an area at the end for a little waterfall, but it wasn’t running during our stay.
Perfect sized pool
There are two properties under the one Botanic Garden ‘banner’. We stayed at the Botanic Garden Homestay which are the family villas. The other property – a couple of doors up, has hotel and dorm style rooms. But, they also have two more swimming pools to choose from! One was nicely shaded by the beautiful fruit trees in the garden and the other had a pool table on the deck.
We arranged a driver through the homestay to pick us up from Da’Nang train station after our overnight train trip and he was there waiting for us with a sign with our name. Botanic Garden Homestay is approximately 30 minutes from the train station.
One thing that we look for in choosing accommodation is restaurants that we can walk to. We really feel like we are on holidays being able to walk to dinner rather than getting into a vehicle. I was a little hesitant as I wasn’t sure there was enough restaurants that we would be able to walk to, but there was plenty! Some of our favourites included Restaurant 328, Red Dragon, Circle and Dingo Deli.
There are bikes available at the Homestay (we didn’t use as we need kiddie seats), loads of many people ride bikes around Hoi An. It would have been great to be able to ride bikes the night we went to The Field Restaurant for dinner. This is a beautiful restaurant in a gorgeous setting only a few minutes away (but be warned – they used lots and lots of chilli) but we couldn’t get a taxi to pick us up to take us home….so 2 lovely staff members gave us a ride home on the back of their motorbikes. I can now say I’ve been on a motorbike – in Vietnam. Never mind helmets – arrgh!!
Lovely (and hot) Hoi An
We were the only Western tourists staying in the villas – which I was surprised about. Buffet breakfast was included and there was a decent fruit and lovely fresh bread selection and they also cooked omelettes to order. Lots of rice and noodle options also.
We were lucky enough to participate in a private cooking class making rice paper rolls and my favourite, Vietnamese salad.
Waiting for our cooking class to start!
The staff were all lovely and happy to help with anything and the gardens etc are obviously well taken care off with love! The rooms were cleaned daily and laundry wasn’t expensive. Overall, this was a great budget option for us that ticked all the boxes and was only approx. $50 US a night – you can’t beat that!
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