Hue

My favorite treat at the market - rice paper with toffee and peanuts!
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We looked forward to the calmer side of Vietnam in Hue (pronounced Hwhey). After our final overnight train in Asia to arrive in Hue, we spent the morning searching through yet another busy market, we had a great lunch at a famous spot where we rolled our own spring rolls and had an egg pancake with meat and shrimp which they are famous for. Quite yummy – especially when the owner hand makes a bottle opener for each of us as a souvenir of our visit. All you need is a small piece of wood and a bolt. He even demonstrated his skill when opening five beers at one time using his special opener.

Our Sunday drive through the countryside
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For our afternoon, we took a tour of the Imperial Citadel and the Forbidden City. It dates back to the early 1800s and much of the architecture and language was influenced by the Chinese who had occupied the territory for over 1000 years prior. Unfortunately, some buildings were destroyed or damaged in the French and Vietnam war but now that it is a UNESCO world heritage site, they are working to preserve and restore the site.

Our next morning we saw some other historic sites including the Thien Mu pagoda, Hamburger Hill, a dragon boat cruise down the Perfume river, one of the emporer’s tombs and lunch at a local nunnery. Our tour included transportation by motorbike. We loved it. Thankfully the traffic wasn’t as crazy as it was in Hanoi, and it sure was nice to pull up to a site past the big coach buses on our motorbikes. All of our motorbike drivers were local and took very good care of us, as did our local guide, Mr. Thanh. We really enjoyed our day, especially when our tour took us to the countryside where we learned how incense and conical hats are made. Scott tried his hand at rolling the incense and did a great job on his first try. The woman was even impressed so we’re thinking this could be his next career opportunity. We got quite wet (see pics) as it is the rainy season here right now in central Vietnam and there is quite a bit of flooding in the countryside.

One of two very old covered bridges in Vietnam. Very ornate compared to those back in the states.
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Next on to Hoi An….

Tidbit of the day: We’ve noticed that the spellings here in Vietnam for the country itself and the cities are actually two words instead of one (ie Viet Nam and Ha Noi). This is the result of the reporters covering the French war in the 40s and 50s where communication was done by Telex and they reduced the cost by combining the words as they paid for each space.