Day 6 - Vietnam Discovery from Hanoi to the Meekong Delta - 'Inside Vietnam' adventure with EXPLORE

Day 6 - Hue City

Hue, although a smaller city, is definitely just as vibrant and lively, car horns in the early hours and in a half sleep state I could have sworn I heard the car horn from Dukes of Hazard.  It’s 7am and I think of an early swim before breakfast, but my body disagrees, apparently, I over did the swim yesterday.  Breakfast in Vietnam is a strange affair if you are western food orientated.  Hot noodles, curries and the like isn’t something I can tackle at 7 in the morning.

An omlette station can be found at most of the hotels to help bridge the culinary gap, pastries and cereals also often found of course.  Otherwise, there is a lot of other yoghurts, fruit and the like to enjoy.  There’s a lot of food items to which I just haven’t a clue what it is, but you can always find some strong Vietnamese coffee.

The people here, for the most part, are very pleasant to all and sundry.  The hotel staff in each of our hotels so far have been kind and understanding.  Local people sometimes stop us on the street, walking or on a scooter, to say 'hello' or 'where are you from?  Oh, nice! goodbye'. 

Following our breakfast, we shuffled back onto the mini-van for a short trip just up the road to the imposing and awe-inspiring complex of the Imperial Palace of Hue City.  The sun breaks through the clouds briefly, already raising the heat of the day towards the usual sweating level.  The are some ominous and dark clouds looming in the distance, threatening to unleash a downpour as we're introduced to our guide for our tour the Imperial palace grounds.  The complex was constructed in the early 1800’s under the guidance of Emperor Gia Long.  It was completed to its current scale in 1833, during the French colonial period, it covers a total area of 160 hectares.  Big!

All the buildings in the complex are fascinating with a very colourful and long history.  The downpours come and go and our hops and sprints between buildings are timed to the breaks in the rain.  It’s a vast complex, so plenty of steps to the daily target for sure and was well worth the visit, our guide as you’d expect, knew their stuff and shared their wealth of knowledge.  Luckily the rain stops in time for the long walk out of the complex.

We're back for a brief pit stop for lunch at the restaurant next door to the hotel, a beautifully decorated restaurant with some amazing food.  I find a lovely looking Shrimp dish and this one is nice and spicy, bit of garlic, lovely.  It’s hot but not too hot, perfect.

Some of us opt for the visit this afternoon to a local market, you know, the ones that seemingly sell everything the human race has created.  The outside food market is really interesting, trying to guess what it is we're looking at!  We go into the indoor market, the heat and humidity are taken up a notch.  The sellers and stall owners do approach you to see if they can entice you but their selling pitch is soft, they're not in your face one bit and don’t chase you down for a bit of bartering.  It's quite an easy feeling to say no and move on by.

On the walk back and once we cross back over the river to the centre, our little band of 5 reduces 1 by 1 as a variety of attractions grab the attention of one person at a time, with just Nick and myself left we stop for a much needed cool beer at the Hot Tuna Bar, a hotel bar at the lively crossroads, to watch the world go by for a little while before the 'Royal' dinner tonight.

We meet for dinner and take the walk to the restaurant for the 'Royal' dinner.  It has become a group consensus that this is the last occasion of these huge set menus we'll have.  There is simply just too much food that arrives on these huge menus.  Within the opulent restaurant surroundings of the restaurant, adorned with Vietnamese lanterns and art, we sit on throne like carved wooden chairs.  It’s a huge restaurant but very empty this evening.

Beers ordered, we enjoy what we can consume of the procession of dishes with a laugh and tales of the days colourful happenings.  The presentation of the food comes on plates with intricately carved animals and birds made from fruits and vegetables.  It’s not the best food we’ve had on the journey so far.  Edible but the standard of food we’ve had so far has set a high bar.

Full to the brim and leaving so much of the food behind we smile with a nod and a 'Cam un' or two to the staff.  We navigate the shortish walk back in the direction of the hotel through the winding streets.  We stop at the now fully awake and lively crossroads near our hotel, with multi-level bars, music pumping and lively crowds enjoying the stormy evening.

We're up the stairs to a first-floor balcony table, perched overlooking the junction.  A fire breathing entertainer, briefly standing in the middle of the junction, lights up the night with his final spluttering flames.  It seems he's done himself a mischief.  He’s almost set light to his own shirt and seems to have swallowed a bit of 4-star petrol.  Never a dull moment in Hue.  A refreshing pint of Vietnamese ‘Huda’ beer and some great laughs it's time to call it a day.  We have a bright and breezy start tomorrow for an almost guaranteed stormy and rainy drive to Hoi An city, further down the coast heading south.