Today was yet another drizzly day, but fortunately, I had nowhere to be, other than wandering the streets, and seeing some of the historic city of Hue.
I started off at the old Imperial City in Hue, which was clearly very Chinese and French inspired, since they were the ones who were in rule at the times it was built and maintained, but this somehow made it feel a little bit Japanese to me.
It was quite cool seeing some of the buildings which had been restored and maintained, contrasted against the other dilapidated buildings, right next to them.
It was quite expensive, but I'm glad I went in, because there weren't too many people there that early, and the whole area was fairly pretty.
After the Imperial City, I headed to Thien Mu Pagoda, a religious site still in use today, with many monks milling around its tall form, and the surrounding gardens.
The pagoda sits right on the Perfume River, the main lifeblood of Hue, and the view from the top of the hill was very impressive.
I also liked the garden of tree-sized bonsais all in pots around a courtyard.
I just wandered around for a while after that, following google map's ideas about cool places to go, and found quite a few tomb sites.
Sadly, most of them were far too expensive to warrant going into, but some which were completely random and in the middle of nowhere (including one which had cows just chilling at it) were an interesting insight into old times in Vietnam.
Tomorrow, Phong Nha xx
