A first-timer’s guide to Hoi An

Hoi An is small enough to walk in an afternoon and rich enough to keep you for a week. The old town — a UNESCO-listed tangle of merchant houses, teahouses and lantern-strung lanes — is the obvious draw, and rightly so.

Come early or come late. In the soft hours after dawn the streets belong to the locals and the light is kind to the ochre walls. By day, escape the heat with a bicycle ride out to the rice paddies and the beach at An Bang.

Time your visit to the monthly full-moon festival if you can, when the electric lights go dark and the whole town glows by lantern and candle. It is touristy, yes — and still, somehow, genuinely lovely.