Exploring More Of Vietnam, Part 4.

Evening in Hue

Yhe perfume River as the sun goes down.

One of the things that is a must while in Hue is to spend the evening down beside the Perfume River, the boats come and go continuously. There is a night market under the Truong Tien Bridge. It's so full of life and it is most worthwhile if you are buying tourist souvenirs.

The fruit ladies do a great job of presenting their fruit.
Mangoes and plums today.

There is poetry in the way these ladies sell their wares.

Truong Tien Bridge at its best.

Truong Tien Bridge

We enjoyed spending our evenings here taking photos as the sun went down. The Perfume River puts on a great display. The following photos were
all taken around the bridge which was built by the French. At least one local explained that this was the reason it looked like the Eiffel Tower, I think he was referring to the metal girders. But whichever way you look at it, the bridge is a real hub of the local life.

Night time arrives and the Perfume river comes alive.

The bridge comes alive and feeds the life of the people.

After our photos during our last night in Hue, we wandered until we found a restaurant that looked interesting. It was hot and we chose one that was closed in with air conditioning. What a great choice we made. The kitchen was on full display and we enjoyed watching the cooks at work. The meal was very good, as they mostly are in this country. We decided to end with a local coffee. We do enjoy their drip process, we made a comment on this and the girl who was looking after us said we could buy some of their coffee. Which we did, we are now enjoying this coffee back in KL.

Everyone comes out to enjoy the local market along the river. 

After our great meal we were looking for some water at one of the local shops nearby, when I just happened to look up and see a shelf full of local drip coffee mugs. We asked if they were for sale, and yes they were. After some more discussion we checked them out. They were exactly what we were looking for. It just kept on getting better, when we discussed the price it was less than half what we had argued about in the local market for three of them. No hard bargaining needed, we took 4. Everyone was happy. The lesson learned, beware of local markets, when you are white skinned, in a tourist town. Especially when you have arrived at the market with a cyclo. Some times the shops on the outside of the markets or in the next block have better prices because the locals enjoy you shopping in their shops. We had a great time in Hue, our last night here was a great end to our holiday.

There are always motorbikes on the road in Vietnam , they never sleep.

Exploring More of Vietnam Part 3.

Hue: Emperors' Tombs

After a very pleasant 4o minute boat trip we arrived at Thien Mu Pagoda.
This was a special place with a true spiritual feeling to it.

Early on day 3 we were met at the hotel by our guide and walked down to the boats on the river. This was a pleasant 40 minute boat trip up the river to  Tien Mu Pagoda. This pagoda and temple was very interesting. When we arrived the monks were blessing fish to be released back into the river. Our guide was excellent at explaining things. He also took us around the back of the temple to show us the Austin that was the car that the Monk Quang Duc drove himself to Saigon in 1963. When he arrived at his destination he got out and set himself on fire as a form of protest against the discriminating policies against Buddhists. I remember the famous photograph of him in flames. Isn’t it amazing what pops up in faraway places.

Every day the monks bless some fish that htey return to the river.

The blessed fish about to be returned to the river.

In 1963 Thich Quang Duc drove his Austin to Saigon, the capital of Vietnam.

When he arrived he got out of his car and set himself alight,
 in protest of the treatment of Buddhists.

From there we were driven by car to Minh Mang’s Tomb. This was simply amazing, it included 24 hectares and is said to resemble Utopia. There were amazing  temples and gardens with pleasant lakes within the walls of this tomb. What a lot of effort went into building this Tomb. Apparently Minh Mang was one of the greatest of the Nguyen Emperors ruling 1820-1840.The honour courtyard has an interesting set of statues along with three gates that closely resemble those seen at the Imperial City at the Citadel.

The Tomb of Minh Mang is considered the most Utopian tomb of Hue.
It covers and area of 24 hectares and is simply amazing.

From here we visited Khai Dinh’s tomb which was smaller and quite different. There was a strong French influence to this tomb. The interior was very impressive. Khai Dinh ruled at the end of the Nguyen Empire 1916-1925. I must say once again I was left in awe of the amount of effort that thesed emperors went to to ensure that they had a prime spot for their afterlife.

Khai Dinh was the last Nguyen Emperor and his tomb had a strong French influence.
It was smaller in area but had many grand features.

The Honour Courtyard has an interesting array of characters protecting him.

We were lucky to have the opportunity to visit Tu Duc’s tomb as well. Tu Duc 1847-1882 killed his brother to take power. His tomb has a very interesting Lotus pond with pavilion that makes a delightful setting for enjoying the beauty of this setting. Also in this tomb there was an interesting area with a temple where once he lived while the tomb was being built. Out the back were the living quarters for his 104 wives. At this stage this area is flattened but it resembles a small village. There are some interesting stories to be told about this emperor. 

Tu Duc killed his brother to ascend the throne. His tomb was grand.
This pavilion was a place where he would drink Lotus tea while
overseeing the construction of his tomb.

The lotus flowers growing in the pond are a special feature of this tomb.

The lotus blooms were not at their best, but we were treated to the
occasional great bloom. The tomb had a very serene relaxed feel to it. 

On our way home we stopped off at a small village where incense and conical hats were being made. We did buy a couple of hats and some incense.  It was a big day in the heat and we were pleased to get back a relax in the hotel. We did reflect on yet another interesting day in an amazing country.

Exploring More Of Vietnam, Part 2

Hue

The Perfume River, Hue, after the sunsets is magical and full of life.

Four nights in Hue was the next part of our itinerary. We arrived mid afternoon it is only a 3 hour drive from Danang there is a tunnel which means it can be done quicker but of course there is not the same views. First stop after checking in was to find somewhere for a bite to eat. No problem really because there are endless options across the road from Century Riverview Hotel.

Exploring the back corners and little lanes in Vietnam holds many surprises.

The walking dollar sign story.

We did have a bit of a disturbing incident with a cyclo who thought he would attach himself to us. First he hounded us, to the point where I suggested that we should go back to the hotel and have swim just to get away from him. After rest time we came out and arranged with him to take us to the local market and told him that we wanted to walk back from there We had our cameras and wanted to spend some time taking photos of the perfume river at sunset.  On the way to the market he reached over and took my sunglasses off and put them on him for a photo. Strange I thought. When we got to the market he said he would wait. We said we did not need him to and that we would walk. A discussion ensued and I sort of forgot about my sunglasses which were now not in sight.The cylco was actually getting quite intimidating at this stage. He had a friend at the market who insisted on attaching herself to us. We told her we did not need her either that we just wanted to look for ourselves. “What do you want?” she kept asking I will show you. "Actually, nothing really. We just want to be left alone."  We also ended up having another scene when we wanted to look at the coffee makers that sit on the cups. The price was high (White faced dollar signs prices!) We were bargaining for 3 when I happened to open a second one to have a look at the inside it was very shoddy. The stall holder tried to say she would change it, after already trying to trick us into buying poor quality items at a very high price. We walked off and she chased us...Until I turned around and told her, "If you cheat, you loose!" In the end we found the back way out of the market, of course by then we had lost all of the willing helpers, who wanted  to relieve us of our money. We did not go back past the front of the market and I lost my sunglasses. The lucky cyclo retained my sunglasses. Leaving a sour taste in our mouths, as a result the rest of the cyclos outside the hotel got no business from us over the next 3 days. Surprise, surprise I did not see that particular cyclo or my sunglasses again. SO I found Bunnings bought some timber, built a bridge and got over it!  

We walked to the Citadel and were rewarded with many great photos
along with new understandings of life for the  Emperors of the Nguyen Dynasty..

Day two in Hue and we were up early. Our mission was to go to the Citadel and explore the Imperial part of the city. It was about a 25 minute walk from our hotel and easy enough to find. We were pleased that we did not go a part of a tour. We ended up spending most of the day here. There was so much to look at including numerous photo opportunities. Here was the home of the Nguyen Dynasty. From 1802 until 1945.At one stage one of the emperors lived here with 104 wives. The design of the Citadel was very interesting. Of course much of it has been damaged in succeeding wars although currently there is ongoing restoration taking place. The work being done to restore parts of this monument is to be commended. I am sure that it will just continue to improve as as place to soak up the history of Vietnam.

One of the royal gates, this one le3ads to the house of the Emperor's Mother.
The middle entrance was for the the Emperor.The left side was for members of the court.
The right side of was for the army and the soldiers.

In the heart of the Citadel is the Purple  Forbidden City.
There were  numerous temples and pagodas. 

Forever the explorer Ruth, managed to brave the very hot conditions.

On our way back to the hotel we stopped by Asia Travel Mate to arrange for a day tour of the tombs. While we were there we decided to spend the morning of our last day in a cooking class. The nice people at Asia Travel Mate arranged all of this for us. Back at the hotel we arranged ot Take the train back to Danang on day 5. The reception desk arranged these and had them ready for us the next day. They couldn’t do enough to help us out.

One of the workers who are doing a fantastic job of renovating the
Citadel back to its new former glory.

Exploring More Of Vietnam

Exploring More Of Vietnam

Sitting next to river this lady had an interesting range in clay whistles for sale.

We have visited Vietnam 5 times during the last six years. So I guess we would have to say we do like this country. Actually during this time we have noticed many changes taking place. We missed out getting to Vietnam last year, when the opportunity came our way for cheap flights to Danag with Air Asia in June, we couldn’t resist. We have planned to explore the middle of Vietnam for a number of years and now here was our chance. We had a window of 8 days, so we decided to go back to Hoi An, for 3 nights before travelling on to Hue via Hai Van pass for 4 nights finally back to Danang and flying home to KL. A small window of time giving us an opportunity to visit one old favourite and one new place.

Hoi An.

The beauty of  Hoi An. 

During our first trip to Vietnam we spent a few days in Hoi An, staying out Cua Dai beach. We loved this area and found the local people delightful. Hoi An is a world Heritage town, mainly due to its 16^th century Japanese bridge. This is very interesting and worth spending sometime exploring. The town has an old part with a number of significant Chinese heritage buildings and a section of shops that have a strong French influence.  It is easy to lose yourself in these areas as you soak up the history and enjoy the large number of interesting shops. The market near the river is very interesting as are all markets in Vietnam towns. In five years this town has grown and at the moment there seems to be a lot of local people doing quite well due to the tourist dollar. Between Danang and Hoi An there has been major development along the beach.  We stayed at a small resort called Bamboo Village in Hoi An. This was a hidden treasure of Hoi An, it was away from the main part of town but close enough so that we could walk into town. We also hired their bicycles for a day so that we could ride around Hoi An and explore it as we wanted. In the afternoon when it got rather hot we returned and cooled off in the swimming pool at Bamboo Village. We took the bicycles back out for our evening meal.  We used the reception staff, who willingly arranged a tour out to Cham Islands and they found us a driver who drove us over to Hue.

Ruth negotiating a pedestrian bridge with the Japanese bridge
in the background, bicucles are a great way to explore Hoi An.

The river is always an ideal place to spend time watching the life
of Vietnam. It doesn't matter where you are there is always a river.

The river ferry takes a load of passengers across the river.
What an enormous load.

Our Cham Island tour was interesting but a little disappointing. It included a walk around the local village at the main jetty. This included a visit to an old temple. From there we went by boat to the tourist beach which was just in the next bay. Some of the group elected to stay here while the rest of us went to snorkel amongst the coral. Sadly there was no live coral where they took the tourists. It was very disappointing to swim in an area that looked very dead and was obviously suffering from the damage of years of fishing. I am afraid that if this is indicative of the snorkelling and diving at Cham Islands I would not advise people to waste their time and money visiting here. We returned to the beach for an excellent lunch and a cooling swim in the sea. This part was good and it was interesting to see somewhere new.

We take the walk across the padi on Cham Island.

Fish drying out in the sun at the local market.

Hai Van Pass...to Hue.

This journey is worth the effort tha views at the top of the pass are spectacular. We got out and spent some time enjoying the view and taking some photos. Well actually Ruth took the photos and I practised because when we got back in our car I realised that I had left my memory card in my laptop and all of the photos I thought I had taken did not exist. At the bottom of the hills on the northern side was Lang Co. This beach looked really nice and I noticed there were a lot of accommodation options. I think this would be a great area to spend a few days. Maybe next time!

(Sorry Team No Photos from me for this stage of the journey.)

Pangkor Island Escape

Pangkor Island Escape

Beautiful safe beach surrounded by jungle.

Our Mid-year holiday finally arrived at the end of May and it just so happened that Ruth and I would be celebrating our 31^st wedding anniversary so we decided we would treat ourselves to a special break. We had two weeks of holiday, which was broken by a need for someone to front up and complete a promotion at a local bookstore in KL on the middle Saturday.

So the question:

How to celebrate our anniversary  and get the best out of our broken two weeks of holiday?

The ideal solution week 1 escape to Pangkor Island for 4 nights and for week 2 make the most of cheap Air Asia Fares to Danang, in Vietnam.  We began our great escape on May 28!

A range of water based activities are available.

We had booked a complete package at Pangkor Island Beach Resort through Agoda. It was self drive so all we had to do was make our own way to Pankor Island and once we arrived at the jetty the resort shuttle would greet us and deliver us to our room in the Seaview wing of Pangkor Island Beach Resort.  We left home midmorning, driving Shrek out through the city and on to Lumut. This 3 hour drive was interesting taking us out along the Expressway to Bidor, where we left the toll roads following the local highway all the way to Lumut. This was a pleasant drive, one thing I will say about Malaysia using the expressways and toll roads makes driving a pleasant experience. The scenery out of KL  is so different and the true Malaysia is a feast of visual experiences. Lumut and Pangkor Island held a fascination for me because recently I had read about how the British Submarines used to frequent this area during the Japanese occupation. Apparently this area  was where they dropped off spies who maintained a network within the Malaysian Jungle. 

Once in Lumut we made our way to the Ferry terminal and found a parking area where Shrek would be safe while we were caught the ferry and continued our escape.  Four nights Parking RM 40.00, seemed reasonable to me. Return ferry to Pangkor RM 19 each.  In no time at all we were standing in the hotel lobby enjoying our welcome drink in paradise.  By the time we had settled into our room it was getting on in the afternoon, of course it was still very hot, so it was time to cool off with a swim in the pool. The pool just happened to have its own Kingfisher Pool Bar. The rest of the afternoon was spent swimming in the swimming pool, sipping a drink from the pool, taking a dip in the sea and having a drink beside the pool then swimming in the pool.

Hornbills are never far away at Pangkor. These knew when it was time to be fed.

They are such interesting birds, that extra bit on top seems to make them top heavy.

Around 6:30 each evening the hotel staff places food out for the Hornbills. This was fun to watch as a large number of birds flew in to enjoy some tasty morsels. Before we knew it, it was time to make our way to dinner. The dinner each night was a buffet, with many local dishes and a range of western dishes included. We enjoyed our dinners on the deck outside while enjoying lovely evening views of the South China Sea.  Facing west means there were some great sunsets.

Amazing sunsets made every evening an visual symphony.

One of the activities that takes place here is Net Hauling, for a fee the resort can arrange for a group of local fisherman to come to the bay and drop a net. If you have paid money you get to take part in hauling in the net. Although on the day we watched this taking place there was no shortage of willing helpers. The net had quite a small mesh so even very small fish are trapped and it covered quite an area. The net seemed to bring in a reasonable haul of fish, however back home we would most likely have returned most to the sea due to their small size. The fish were placed in a bag and the gentleman who had paid got to keep them for his dinner. I believe the hotel prepares them for the meal that evening for the guests who have paid for them. It was an interesting experience and we enjoyed being able to take part. It reminded me of the days I used to spend on Tauranga harbour chasing mullet with a net, back in the 1980s.

Net hauling seems to be very popular, it was interesting to watch these guys at work.

For most of the rest of our time we spent taking walks along the beach, reading books, swimming and relaxing on the delightful beach or in the pool. We were well looked after by Rama from the Kingfisher bar who ensured that we did not dehydrate. By the 31 of May we felt we had experienced a great escape and were ready for our Vietnam adventure the following week.

Any way you look at it Pangkor Island is paradise.