Tigon Hotel Hue

... fair play if you have the power), some bomb shelter across from hamburger hill (might mean something to someone more educated than us) and a budist temple where we got to witness a prayer session which was cool. (saw a sign that said 'no hue' didn't manage to get photo so just reminding myself)

left for hoi an on the third day as not much else to do in hue.

... Zone), so on Monday we went on a DMZ tour, but it didn't start too well...our bus broke down on a bridge after about 30 mins but once our replacement arrived we were back on track..

Early on in the day we visited an Ethnic Minority Village and then saw the Khe Sanh Combat Base, Ho Chi Minh Trail, crossed from 'South Vietnam' into 'North Vietnam' and also went into the Vinh ...

... notebook so it goes into the blog no matter how irrelevant.

Oh get a load of this, i know i'm a bit stuck on the dog meat thing but here goes. As i previously indicated, dogs are not adored pets here, they are used for safety and protection only. When they get older, they get colder so they protect their noses with their tails to keep warm so they can sleep at night. In order to keep the dogs alert, their owners cut their tails when the dogs get ...

... I saw something Chinese. Even though the palace wasn't that old (built in 1822, 50 year before the country became a French colony), it style is 100% Chinese. Everything - the layout, the architect, the name of the buildings, the decoration, the costume, the couplets and poems painted inside the buildings - are absolutely, positively 100% Chinese. By the rhythms and rhyme schemes of the poems, I knew the words were supposed to be read in ...

... to the Citadel because it was just tooooo hot to walk!



The citadel is over the other side of the Perfume River & is a 10 km walled & moated collection of palaces & buildings built in the 1800's by the emperor at that time. It cost us 55,000 Dong to go in ( $4 Aus). We didn't cover it all as it is huge - lot of it has fallen down due to war ...

... go have a drink, and come back. I found Luke, I must have had a desperate look on my face when the first words out of my mouth were "I think I’ve lost my underwear.". He couldn’t stop laughing. I had a drink and went back out. I decided to use the ole "walk in a spiral" trick. I set my sandals where I thought they should be. For whatever reason I started on the outside and walked in. It must have been 3:30 in the morning, and at one point a little old Vietnamese guy came ...

... the highlight was the people, as we received warm smiles and curious looks from the many Vietnamese who had come into the city from nearby villages. Finally we were treated as human beings not a walking wallet.

The following day we were up early to visit the many tombs but heard rain hammering on our window. At lunchtime the rain was still falling and by the time we had dinner at 7pm many roads were flooded, there had been no let up in the rain ...

... it used to serve as a US military base but now just blends in as just another hill.

Minority Villages- we were told a little about the villagers and their daily lives. We were told you cannot take their pictures because they believe it takes your soul away. That was not a problem since we didn't even get out of the bus and just stared at their homes as we drove on. While I support the privacy they are given I think it's false advertising ...

... e autonomamente. Ore 14.30, nel pomeriggio visitiamo i luoghi di maggior interesse della citta': la cittadella fortificata da 10 km di spesse mura, la torre della bandiera che e' alta 37 mt. ed e' il pennone piu' alto del Vietnam, i nove cannoni sacri simbolo di protezione collocati vicino le porte di accesso. i due laghetti: lago Tinh Tam e lago Tang Tao, la pagoda nazionale di Dieu De. Una curiosita' per ...

... absolutely lovely. They live in Melbourne & gave us some good advice & ideas for when we arrive there. Di was even kind enough to give us her number, so we can hopefully grab a drink or some food with them when we pass through in November.

It was then back in the bus and off to the next stop, which was (surprise surprise) a traditional craft shop by the ...