Day 8: Hue

Perfume River

It has been raining all day again, so we didn't get to do as much as we planned. We did still get out and see a bit of the city. Went to the market to do some shopping. It's a small area jam-packed with shops and people. We had to be careful the further back we went because the aisles were very narrow and there were people pushing around you at every step. Very much like the streets, the areas are close together and and a bunch of them sit side by side and sell the same thing. We heard "Madame, t-shirts!" a few dozen times on each row.

Dragon Boat on Perfume River

That said, we still found some fun stuff and it felt good to get out, even in the rain. It's not cold, so the rain is more nuisance then really bad, but the streets and sidewalks are flooded easily. We stopped at a bakery after dinner and had some yummy cakes - a chocolate loaf and pistachio something - it was good, but we aren't sure what it was!

Tomorrow we are heading to the island of Phu Quoc. Hope to have more sunshine and beach time!

Hue Market

Yummy cakes

Days 6-7 Hue

Dragon on gate to Imperial City

So we left the crazy streets of the Old Quarter in Hanoi behind and made our way to Central Vietnam, namely the city of Hue. Today Hue is known for all the historic monuments, pagodas and tombs within the city. We are not far from both the old DMZ (demilitarized zone) or the coast. During the war, Hue saw very heavy fighting. It is slightly warmer here, but we are getting rain - its not stopping us from seeing what we want to though!

We arrived kind of late yesterday, so didn't see much besides the streets close to our hotel - there are a lot of Europeans in this area. Today we spent most of our time in the Imperial City - also known as the Citadel or in Vietnamese Dai Noi.  It is HUGE! It was established by Emperor Gia Long in 1805. There are numerous buildings within the walls of the city. We spent 5 hours exploring different areas.

Looking in on the queen's palace

Tomorrow we plan to hit some historic pagodas and tombs that lie on the amusingly named Perfume River (it does not smell like perfume....).

There are several local bars in the area quite near our hotel that we have spent our evenings at, enjoying the local brews. The names of the bars are funny: The DMZ and the Why Not? bar. As for food (this is for you Dawn) we have mainly been eating Vietnamese style noodles and spring rolls in this area.

Heading in to the Imperial City

A gate decorated with carvings

Yummy crispy noodles

Days 4-5: Back to Hanoi

After Halong Bay, we went back to Hanoi. We are staying at a nice little hotel on a side street in the Old Quarter. We have been able to navigate all around here and get to tourist attractions, shopping and food. Our first day back we wandered around the shopping district. Each street has it's own speciality of shopping - there is a silver street, paper street, pharmacy street, candy street, etc. In modern times, we also found a sunglasses row, shoes row, etc.

The next day we visited the Temple of Literature, which was established in 1070 to honor Confucius. One of the first courtyards is filled with Tortoise Stele, stones mounted on tortoise pedestals with a brief history of the scholars who passed the examinations - basically it's a big stone college diploma. It was another spot of quiet in the middle of the noisy city.

After the Temple, we went over to One Pillar Pagoda. It's a small pagoda in a lotos pond standing on just one pillar. The area around it was beautifully gardened. We then went back over to the Hoan Kiem Lake area to wander the streets and shop a bit. We went to an area known for Bia Hoy - Fresh Beer. The beer is like a home brew and only cost us 25cents per glass! There was a corner filled with these beer places and you sit out in plastic chairs on the street corner and drink beer!

We spent the evening at a Water Puppet Theater. This type of art dates back one thousand years and it is a authentic Vietnamese expression of culture. The themes relate to rural life. The puppets are controlled by puppeteers behind a screen standing waist deep in water. It was a lot of fun - we didn't understand a word, but the puppets get the point across.

We had a nice dinner and headed back to our hotel. Today we are going to Hue, our next stop in Central Vietnam.

Stone Stele - large diplomas of scholars

Confucius

One Pillar Pagoda

Water Puppet Theater

Beer on the corner!

View from our beer corner

We like our Fresh Beer!

Days 2-3 Halong Bay

View from Amazing Cave

We took a four hour drive out to visit Halong Bay which is a World Heritage Site. In fact it is in the running for being one of the 7 Natural Wonders of the World.

We stayed on board the Santa Maria Cruiser (there is also a Nina and a Pinta - lol) for one night. When we arrived we were served lunch. We had 6 courses! We had no idea when the food was going to stop coming out. At dinner we were prepared and didn't eat as much of each course. All the food was wonderful and beautifully prepared.

After lunch we went to Hang Sung Sot - The Amazing Cave. Our tour guide, Trung, was very knowledgeable and pointed out many fun shapes in the cave. We then headed over to a bay with a pearl farm. We were supposed to go swimming, however it was a bit to chilly, so we just dipped our feet in. Then Trung sat with us and gave us a Vietnamese basic language lesson so we could speak more comfortably while here. It was a lot of fun, especially when we came to the word for spring roll - nem. Melanie connected the word nem to the movie "The Secret of Nimh." We told Trung and he started calling it the secret spring roll!

The second day at Halong, we went kayaking. It was so peaceful once Melanie and I figured out how to kayak together... It was beautiful and we kayaked through several caves and bays. We have a great video to play of a bit of our trip (see below).

After the kayaking we had another really big lunch and then got back on the bus to Hanoi.

The pineapple was lit like a lantern

Santa Maria

Shrimp Spring Rolls

The Amazing Cave!

Halong Bay