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Published: November 18th 2007
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Once the 20hr epic night trail from Saigon finally arrived in Hue', on the East coast of Vietnam, I was enthusiastically set upon by hungry taxi drivers and moto men all of whom had a lot more energy than I did after the long journey up the coast. After playing them off against each other (let them barter for me) I opted for a leasurely taxi and was quickly in my hotel. En route, as is very common so far in Asia, the taxi driver had been insisting on taking me somewhere else, to a "very good hotel he know" but I told a fib that I had to meet a friend at the one I had picked from Lonely Planet (aka "Lonely Bugger" in my case now without Trung) and got some peace and quiet to enjoy looking out the window at the passing town.
The hotel was pretty nice, a $10 a night room with a mini bar and balcony, certainly a bonus for Vietnam at that price. Lonely Planet had come good which was a relief as Trung and I had been fairly blaise' when arriving in towns leaving things to an exciting degree of chance. While
The Crew From Hue
Floren and Christina (Germany), Me, Carmen and Luke (Aussies) travelling on my own however, I want to be a bit more sure in the knowledge that I at least have some decent looking options and preferebly a Plan A and a Plan B on the accommodation front.
While looking for a place to have dinner on my own for the first evening, I ended up in an open fronted cafe-come-pub directly opposite my hotel so I sat down with the company of my book and a Buda beer and wondered how the whole traveling alone thing would go. Very shortly, I got chatting to the owner of the bar, a woman called Thu who would turn out to be a bit of a laugh and quite a character over the next coming nights ("Here's your change - phone your mother and tell her you won't be home tonight..."). Through her trying to sell me a tour the next day around the town, I got chatting to an Aussie couple and before I knew it, we were drinking away, joining tables and exchanging travel tales and the like. Meeting the awesome Luke and Carmen was just what I needed to calm the nerves and gain some confidence around traveling
alone and we went on to share beers and laughs alongside other travellers who would come and go at "Cafe On Thu Wheels" over the coming evenings.
The cultural highlight of Hue' came from taking Thu up on her legendary tour around the area from the back of a motorbike with a driver-come-tour guide. Luckily, on the morning I took the tour, I turned up at Cafe On Thu Wheels and met a German girl called Tanja who had also been cajooled by Thu. Tanja had also just parted ways from her travel buddy from home and it was great to have some mutual company while wandering around the sites that we would be driven to.
The tour itself was a lot of fun and really interesting, stopping off at rural villages, pagodas, padi fields, shrines, temples and even an old war-time bunker complex. It was a great way to glimpse into life in Vietnam outside of a town or city and that morning has to go down as a highlight of the whole trip.
The following day, I wandered around the side of town behind the giant, ancient citadel, where not many tourists venture. It was
a drizzly day that day and when I got back wet to Cafe on Thu Wheels, the common line of conversation at the tables was revolving around the imminent typhoon that was heading in from the South China sea and heading directly for Hue'. It confirmed my decision to leave Hue' the next day and I was later to find out from Trung (who arrived in the same hotel in Hue' just 30 mins after I'd set off that morning) that the next couple of days would see heavy flooding (the 'typhoon' lessening to a 'tropical depression') with boats sailing up the street outside the hotel and thigh deep water in the hotel reception.
Luckily for me, I was already on my way to Hanoi, on a 12 hour day time train ride North trying to keep momentum going so I can introduce a 12 day visit to Laos in between leaving Vietnam and heading to Japan. First off though was another eagerly anticipated trip - to go check out the enigmatic waters and islets of Ha Long Bay!
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