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Published: January 11th 2007
We got the sleeper train to Hue at 8pm. Before the train left , Steve went to buy beer from a vendor on the platform. The beer was very expensive, just like railway stations everywhere, and he tried haggling with the lady unsuccessfully. When he tried charming her, she threatened to charge him extra!
On-board, we were joined in our compartment by a middle-aged German woman, Charlie, and her American boyfriend, Eric. A bit of an odd pair really, seemed they hadn't been together long and were still working each other out. Orla also noted that Charlie wasn't wearing a bra or any pants - not really the done thing in a confined train compartment with strangers!! Luckily Steve was too dozy to notice! Charlie also managed to polish off a bottle of wine and some vodka within about an hour. They were nice enough though and we had a good chat with them.
Before the train left, a tout asked if he could spend a few minutes showing us information about his new hotel in Hue, Thai Binh II . We were pleased with the offer of a pick-up from the train station and he kept repeating we
Moving house?!
Who needs an expensive removal van when you can hire a cyclo??! Lets hope there are no hills!!!were "under no obligation to stay there", so we gave him our names so that we could get the free lift into Hue town centre. As he left us, he told us he was a receptionist in the hotel and he hated being in Hanoi. He hoped we would like the hotel, then write to Lonely Planet so lots of people would stay there and he wouldn't be sent away to drum up business!! Poor him!
The journey was quite good, slept quite well, probably the beer!! We got our lift but stayed at Thai Binh I rather than II, just because it was cheaper!
After checking in, we walked to the Perfume River and had a drink in a floating restaurant. Then we walked over the bridge towards the Citadel. We noticed how much the Vietnamese women shield themselves from the sun. It was much hotter in Hue than it had been in Hanoi, yet the women had every inch of their skin covered. All we could see wass their eyes, peering out over the top of their face-masks. Even when wearing a t-shirt, they wear what looks like stockings over their arms, topped off with
Party time in 'On Thu Wheels'
Taking advantage of happy hour!! Having a great time with Andy and Caroline from Northern Ireland a pair of gloves. How they don't faint from the heat, we don't know! Someone later explained to us that white skin is considered beautiful so they don't want to get a tan. The irony of everyone at home trying to get brown didn't go unnoticed.
The desire for white skin is also evident in women's toiletries in SE Asia. Moisturisers, body lotion, even deoderant are described as 'whitening'. Orla will look like a ghost by the time we get back to England!!
While we were walking around, we saw many war 'souvenirs' for sale on the streets such as US soldiers' dog tags, which we thought was tasteless.
Having been asked if we wanted a cyclo tour by about 10 different guys, we decided to duck into a restaurant to avoid them. However, once in the restaurant, a guy who worked there got out his paintings for us to see and tried very hard to sell some to us. He was a bit rude when we said we weren't interested. The restaurant, Lac Thien, was mentioned in our guide book and had a good write-up. All we can say is pANTS!! There were ants all over
The Pub Games!!
After a few drinks Thu leads the way on the party games! our food - trouble is we didn't really notice until we were half way through! Yuk! We left straight away and got a cyclo tour!!!
The cyclo tour was interesting. It went all round the old town; we felt a bit sorry for the man having to cycle with both of us onboard. That pity vanished when he conned us. We agreed a price for an hour tour. He then took us back to our hotel and suddenly the price had doubled, yet we'd only been an hour and 15 minutes. The language barrier suddenly becomes very useful to con artists like our cyclo-man, who just claimed not to understand our complaints.
Slightly cheesed-off, we went into the bar opposite our hotel, called 'On Thu Wheels', which was managed by a lovely but very mad lady called Thu. She was about 40 and single and claimed she was looking for a nice western man. She had a list of her requirements on the wall such as 'not too fat, not too thin' and 'not too rich, not too poor'. She kept referring to males as "bananas" and females as "coconuts"! She was nuts! We had a drink, then
Japanese bridge
1st stop on our motorbike tour around Hue met Andy and Caroline, from Northern Ireland, who had been on the train the night before and had taken the same offer of a free pick-up to Thai Binh. Thu had a happy hour and the drinks were so cheap. We sat chatting to Andy and Caroline and had a few more drinks, then a few more, then Thu started to introduced some pub games. We had a great time and went to bed at kicking out time, just a little bit sloshed!
Fortunately, we remembered in time that we had booked a motorcycle tour through Thu for 8:30. We crawled into the bar and sat down for breakfast. Then our guides turned up and off we went. We were a little apprehensive having seen the volume of traffic on the roads and the way some of them drive, but our drivers were great. We raced through Hue and out into the countryside, driving down tracks the size of small footpaths, to our first stop - the Japanese bridge. Built over 200 years ago, the wooden bridge was completely authentic, which was amazing as our guide showed us a marker with the flood levels caused by major typhoons,
all of which were more than the height of the bridge. Back on the bikes we went to view the Perfume River from a hill where the French had built some bunkers. Next up was a temple, where we saw monks going for a walk and meditating with their families who had come to visit them. There were also some monks at prayer in the main temple. We sat and watched them for about 1/2 hour; it was very peaceful and relaxing. Until Orla sprang a water bottle leak from her bag. She was in a panic that one of the monks would slip over on their way out of the temple and that it would bring bad karma!!
Next, we whizzed off to see Tu Doc's mausoleum. Emperor Tu Doc ruled Vietnam from 1847 to 1883. The mausoleum was surrounded by impressive pavilions, pine trees and a serene lake. Tu Doc had it constructed as a place for boating, fishing, meditating and composing some of the 4,000 poems he is said to have written. Apparently it took 3 years to complete and more than 3,000 Vietnamese died building it. On the bikes again, we drove back through Hue
and a market selling everything from spices, fruit, vegetables and clothes to fish and piglets!! We went to Thien Mu Pagoda, a centre that has long been a place for Buddhist protest against repression. Its most famous monk, Thich Quang Duc, burned himself to death in Saigon in 1963, in demonstration against communist rule attempting to eliminate his religion. The famous picture of him is on display here, as is the blue Austin car in which he drove himself to Saigon.
Finally, we rode back to town and stopped outside the Ngo Mon Citadel gate for photos. It was then back to 'On Thu Wheels' for lunch.
After lunch, we ambled back over the river to the Citadel. Only a small proportion of the original buildings have survived to today. The area is truly vast, and it seems quite amazing that such a large area in the centre of town has remained a ruin.
That night, we went for a curry at Omar Khayyam's Tandoori. We sat down, ordered and were really looking forward to our meal when all the lights went out. A complete power-cut across the district. Everyone was caught unawares, and we had to
Tu Doc
Steve finds a friend who doesn't mind hearing all about how great Aston Villa is!! sit in the pitch black for 3 or 4 minutes before a bright spark from the restaurant remembered they had a torch! It was all quite exciting until we realised that the chef was probably trying to cook our dinner in the dark! Light was restored after about 15 minutes and when our dinner arrived, it was yummy.
Up at 5:30am on the 18th! Today we were going on a tour of the Demilitarised Zone (DMZ), a strip of land 5km either side of the Ben Hai river that was effectively a no man's land in what the Vietnamese call 'The American War'. On the bus, our guide told us that around 10 people per month were still injured by mines in the Dong Ha area. Mostly children, unaware of the dangers, playing in the fields. We went to the Vinh Moc tunnels first. An amazing complex of tunnels where over a thousand civilians sheltered, for up to 5 days at a time, from the American bombardments. The tunnels were on 3 levels and descended to about 25m. There were freshwater wells, a generator, family rooms, and a maternity 'ward' where 17 children were born!! We made our
way through some of the tunnels and could barely imagine how horrific it would have been to live down there. The tunnels were narrow, with low roofs, it was really hot and of course, they were dark and dirty. It was really interesting.
The rest of the DMZ tour was a let down, although the scenery was very nice. Virtually all of the original army bases, war relics, etc, have gone, most of it apparently used by the Vietnamese for rebuilding when the Americans left. We were supposed to imagine all the barracks, tanks, planes, runways, etc, that were once there. One such place was Khe Sanh, originally an American base and place of a famous battle. There was a museum there but we found it extremely pro-North Vietnamese army, telling us how strong and brave they were, alongside pictures of American soldiers with captions stating 'how frightened they were'. All unnecessary bluster and bravado. There was a visitors' book and a note inside from an ex-American soldier who was clearly upset by the whole display.
Back in Hue and feeling very tired after a 12-hour tour, we had take-away pizza and sat in our room watching a
Thien Mu Pagoda
Still on our bike tour! trashy movie. It was great.
8am pick-up for our bus to Hoi An. The bus stopped half way at a nice beach for 30mins. We watched a long-haired, bushy bearded man dressed completely in orange doing yoga on the beach. Why is it that they always look like that?!
Got to Hoi An and walked into town. It's a fairly small place. We had lunch at 'Bo Bo' and bumped into Andy and Caroline again. They recommended hiring bikes and cycling around, so we took their advice. We enjoyed touring around on our bikes and stopped on the riverfront at 'Cafe Can', to have a thirst quenching beer. It sounds like we have a lot of beer but sometimes it's cheaper than having a soft drink. That's our excuse anyway!! After our lovely beer, we looked around the shops in the quaint alleyways. Lured into a clothes shop, we were soon discussing styles, materials and colours with the tailors. Thirty minutes later and we'd both been measured up, Steve for a suit and Orla for a winter coat.
We dropped our bikes back, walked into town again and had a fantastic barbeque at 'Cafe Hia'.
8am pick-up again!!! Trip to My Son to see the World Heritage-listed Cham ruins. Quite interesting but the ruins have been spoilt by bomb damage and our guide wasn't very informative, which was a bit of a let-down.
Back in Hoi An, it was time for our fittings. Orla's coat wasn't quite ready and Steve's jacket needed some altering, so we had to go back later. It was just the excuse we needed to wait up on the balcony of 'Cargo Club boulangerie', having a drink and eating cake, looking at the lovely river view. It was very pleasant. We'd discovered that balconies were the place to sit to avoid the hawkers that come into restaurants selling books, jewellery, food.
We still had time to pass, so we cruised the river on a rowing boat. An old lady sat at the back and steered as Steve did most of the paddling! We witnessed a fisherman casting his nets - didn't witness any fish though! We also saw some floating pigs!! Well, they were in a hut floating on the river. The river ferry overtook us, the owner obviously attempting to break the world record for the number of
Inside Hue Citadel
Most of the original buildings had been destroyed during the war and by natural disasters people and motorbikes you can fit on a boat without it sinking!!!
Afterwards we bumped into Cam and Sara, a Canadian couple we had met on the DMZ tour a few days previously. Cam offered to take us to a bar selling cheap beer, how could we refuse?! The beer cost 3,000 Dong (about 10p) - Hunters Lane lot, please note!
When we returned to the shop to collect our clothes, Cam and Sara came with us. Steve tried on his suit, which was perfect. Cam was impressed enough to order his own suit! The button positioning on Orla's coat was causing a few problems, so the shop assistant took Orla (still wearing her red winter coat when it was 30 degrees outside) on the back of her motorbike to the tailor's down the road. She looked so funny! The four of us then went to dinner on the riverfront. We shared local speciality dishes - Cao Lau, thick rice-flour noodles with beansprouts and pork-rind croutons in a light soup topped with thin slices of pork, White Rose, a rose shaped noodle with shrimp in the middle and Banh Bao, crab steamed in flour parcels with chilli. It
Vinh Moc tunnels
On our tour of the DMZ was all delicious.
Tuesday 21st and it was time to leave for Nha Trang; a taxi was picking us up from our hotel to take us to Da Nang train station. We had a few things to do first. We wanted to try and book the open tour bus from Nha Trang to Dalat for the next day, as it left at 7am and we wanted to ensure we had seats. We walked to the Anh Phu bus office but they were very unhelpful; we'd just have to get up early and hope we could get a seat on the bus. Next, we took our new clothes to the post office (typically the other side of town!) The woman at the counter tried to persuade us to send everything home via airmail - this costs a fortune. She even tried to convince us that our clothes would be ruined by a sea journey. We hope she's wrong. After an age in the post office filling in 300 forms and signing our lives away we hurried back to the hotel, just in time for our taxi.
The taxi journey was quicker than we anticipated and we arrived with
Khe Sanh
Site of American base in Vietnam war and famous battle. plenty of time to spare. Orla had spotted a Triumph shop (bras not bikes!) on the way in and went off to buy a strapless bra to wear under her new tops from Hanoi. While she was in the changing room, the shop assistant strolled in and started grappling her boobs and shoving them into the bra. Orla was taken aback. This certainly doesn't happen in M&S!!! Still she came away with a new bra and the lady gave her some "souvenirs" (the only word she could speak in English) - a free sloggi baseball cap and some whitening deodorant - so she can't really complain.
In the train station, we were surprised to bump into Cam and Sara again. They had changed their plans and managed to get tickets for the same train as us. The train was late, so we could have been back in England!! But only by ten minutes, so not really up to our standards!! The train journey was 8 hours and all the way a tv continously blared out music or film. Arriving at Nha Trang at 10pm felt like coming out of a concert with our ears still ringing! The train was
Monks taking in the view
A stop on our way to Hoi An really comfortable with plenty of space and air-conditioning. We thought it was the perfect temperature but the locals were sat wearing coats and woolly hats!!
We caught a taxi into town with Cam and Sara but stayed at different places as we wanted to be near the bus stop for our early morning trip to Dalat.
Nha Trang was full of loud, trashy bars - great if you're looking for a night out, but not if you're tired and have to be up early!! Luckily our hotel was far enough away from them that we managed to have a good night's sleep.
5:45am, Wednesday 22nd. We seemed to getting up earlier and earlier! We got to the open tour bus office and booked our seats, then had a noodle breakfast from a street stall, a quick look at the beach (which was beautiful) before catching the bus.
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Pete Josephs
non-member comment
Durian
Hello Steve and Orla. Great diary. Have you tried a fruit called "Durian" yet. I would be interested to hear your comments on that.