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Published: November 22nd 2005
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Punting down river
a rice farmer on the Hoi, Hue After an excellent and very busy/drunken adventure in the Northern Islands of Vietnam we boarded the night train to Hue in Ha Noi.
The train was good, 14 hours in a sleeper cabin with these 2 Vietnamese dudes, one of whom was afraid of the dark as he never put his light off all night, Fiona took the top bunk as I couldn't climb due to the injury I had sustained on the bus back to Ha Noi from Halong Bay.
I was sitting in the seat minding my own with my foot in the isle when we turned a sharp corner and a French women's suitcase, one of those tip-top Samsonite numbers, (no doubt filled with cheese and plans on how to surrender) fell from the overhead store on to my foot, 'luckily' it hit my toe and I lost yet another nail with blood pishing everywhere, not ideal but an inch further up and I was looking at a broken foot in my medical opinion.
Luckily the Belgian on the bus was a nurse and she bandaged me up for the journey ahead, sure it was sore but I'm a trouper, and in truth I was
pretty gassed so the pain came the next morning, it's the first injury of the trip though so that cannae be bad, and we now have a use for the 50 pound 'Boots' first-aid box we've been carrying about all year.
So the train went without incident, we cheated our way through a few games of Gin Rummy with the locals then had an early night when the bar closed at 11pm, nine hours later we arrived in Hue and set about finding a hotel. We found a nice spot across the river from the old quarter and the Citadel and settled in for a few days of wandering around and relaxing in the old town.
We took a day tour on the back of a couple of motorbikes with local guides, Fiona's guide spoke English while I couldn't tell you if mine spoke Vietnamese as he didn't open his mouth all day! Never the less we had a great day, it started off with morning prayers at a local Buddhist Monastery then we went up the hills to the waterfall, down to the Thien Mu sacred pagoda and Royal Tombs, then on to the Japanese Friendship bridge
Prayer O'clock
in Hue, Vietnam and lunch in a little village surrounded by paddy fields, we also seen some ruminants of the American War (not the Vietnam War!!) as Hue is very close to the DMZ between the former Communist North and American backed South.
You'll see from the pictures that I switched to black and white for some added 'arty' affect, you students out there will love it, I think it looks good but I now struggle to remember that we have a colour option too.....
We enjoyed Hue, we crossed paths with people we've met on the trip from Laos and also from the boat trip up North, it's amazing how many times that has happened this year and it's always good to catch-up and swap stories and recommendations with those who we've met before.
We're really enjoying Vietnam after not liking Ha Noi and I think it'll be grand now all the way until Saigon, Ha Noi's bigger and uglier brother.
Peace out.
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