back in Vietnam

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Well after spending almost 3 weeks longer than I expected to in Laos, I headed back to Vietnam, but not without one last grueling bus trip. After the typhoon I was keen to get to Vietnam as soon as possible, so I caught a direct bus from Pakse in Laos to Hue in Vietnam, but it was a hell of a trip, the unairconditioned bus was full of Vietnamese men chain smoking, the luggage was piled so high in the aisle that you had to crawl to get out of the bus, and we had a 7 hour wait at the border. After all of that, we were only a couple of kilometres into Vietnam when the bus stopped yet again, and to my surprise the luggage guys got out screwdrivers to open up the airconditioning vents - which I thought were broken - but were actually being used to conceal live snakes smuggled in sacks!! But after finally getting to Hue I really felt like I was in another country, maybe even Europe. It was so strange to see busy streets again, landscaped gardens and highrise buildings after being in Laos for so long.

I only stayed in Hue for two days as I was wanting to get to other places in Vietnam, but in those two days in Hue I think I did more sightseeing than in my entire time in Laos! No joke... in a month and a half in Laos I saw 2 museums, 4 temples (that I paid entry to see), 4 caves and a couple of waterfalls... In two days in Hue I saw the old citadel (it used to be the capital of Vietnam) and ALL of the buildings inside, including palaces, temples and a history museum. And then the next day I saw 3 emperors tombs and a pagoda. It was sightseeing overload...

I mean it was nice to see some sights for a change - but I really felt like just another tourist. And I couldn't get over just how many tourists there were everywhere! It's nice to look at historical stuff, and read about it, and maybe even hire a guide, but after 2 days in Hue, although I had seen a lot, I really hadn't seen that much... Racing through cities like that in such a short space of time, it really feels like a bit of a waste, but that is the way most people seem to travel through Vietnam.

While I was in Hue it was the middle of the lunar month in Vietnam, and the mid-autumn festival was on, where children dragon danced to the beat of drums in the streets and it was amazing to see such huge crowds of people out at night! The dragon dancers looked like they were having a lot of fun, and some of them were really, really good. I really enjoyed such a lively festival atmosphere after spending so long in sleepy towns in Laos.

So after only two and a half days in Hue, I moved on to Hoi An, as I had less than two weeks of my trip left... but on the way we passed through Danang, which only 5 days earlier had been hit by the biggest typhoon that people could remember - 71 people had lost there lives... and seeing the damage done there is wasn't hard to believe, the whole place was a complete wreck, the beaches were destroyed and every building that was left standing seemed to have some kind of damage...

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Photos

me and a mandarin
at Ming Mang's tomb

dragon dancers
out celebrating the mid-autumn festival