Blogs from North Central Coast, Vietnam, Asia - page 94

The arrival in Hue was welcome change from Danang and it was clear from the outset that we would be having more fun and better food here. We found a small bar the DMZ that we used as base camp for the next few days that was always busy with backpackers. It served great food and meant that our newly rented room was only a stones throw from cold beverages. The standard of living in Vietnam has outweighed all expectation as for the princely sum of six U.S dollars it is possible to rent a place with air-con, t.v, fridge, and hot water. For the same price in Cambodia we rented a box with broken fan and cockroaches. Where it excels in home comforts Vietnam lacks in quality of food, meaning if we found a good ... read more

Throughout our travels so far we have found the Lonely Planet to be spot on or leading us a merry dance in equal measures thus being a bit hit and miss. When we re-read the following passage ‘Many travellers have fallen victim to the Vientiane to Vietnam bus scam, in which agents - often guest houses - sell tickets for ‘air con tourist coaches’ that turn out to be rattletrap public buses or mini vans packed to the limit with Vietnamese bringing cheap goods home from Laos. These trips can become mini-nightmares including a long wait at the border, and some Vietnamese drivers treat Westerners extremely badly.’ an hour into the journey, we wished we’d not dismissed this as a ‘miss’ piece of advice, as it pretty much summed up our journey from Vientiane to Hue ... read more

One of the things you must do in Hue is a cruise down the Perfume River. As we had had 5 early starts in a row we decided to have a sleep in and consequently missed the group tour down the river, so we decided to charter our own boat and go for a cruise. After a lot of price negotiation we were taken out on a dragon boat and cruised up river to see another pagoda, and the tomb of Tu Doc. At the pagoda we just jumped off, took a few photos and jumped back on. We then cruised about another 45 mins upriver to get to where we thought the tomb was, however we were about to fall victim to our first scam, the cunning lady on the boat told us we had ... read more

We had a great day touring the old demilitarized zone. The sights themsleves needed quite a bit of imagination as there isn't much left of the old bunkers/military bases. But the guide we hired for the day was good fun and had loads of interesting tales to tell. He was only 17 at the time but his father had fought in the war for the south and he had picked up some stories from him. The highlight of the day was a tour round the old VC tunnels near Vinh Moc. We were also very glad we had opted to spend a few more pennies here and take a motorbike tour as we met some very unhappy travellers who had taken the bus tours and hated every minute of it. ... read more

North to South - the first two stops on the road down through Vietnam. In Hue, (pronounced Who - ay), Helen and I ate disgusting pasta that had so much garlic in it, we felt nauseous. Actually, everytime I crave western food I go for Pasta (in India it was usually the only western choice) and its always rotten so now I have finally learned and banned myself from ordering pasta. To work off the pasta in our bellies and to avoid looks of scorn and hatred from locals due to our pong we hired bicycles and cyled for hours around the city. It was great! We both couldn't remember the last time we were on bikes and these were ancient models with curving handlebars and hard high seats so that you were sitting high and ... read more