Sweet day on the Perfume River

Today did an all-day tour up the Perfume River, which runs through Hue. The boat was rickety, noisy and fantastic. We loved every minute of it. As always, click on any picture to enlarge it.

The city life focuses on the river, and the main market can be accessed by boat or by land.

The Perfume River runs right through the middle of Hue, and just a few Kilometers upriver you get into the foothills and farmland. 75% of the population of Vietnam is rural and involved in agriculture. This country is so beautiful- very mountainous and very green.
This tour (which cost all of $5), was really great. We spent the day cruising up the river, stopping at historical sites and walking around the grouds of some amzing temples.

The sites we visited were sprawling, walled complexes, much like the Citadel in Hue but set back in the forests and rural areas. They were basically huge, beautiful parks with amazing landscape architecture, complete with rolling hills, and lakes. The pictures don't really do them justice, as it was the grounds and layout we found to be so appealing.

Here's a glimpse of daily life in rural Vietnam. Lots of little homes and farms were along the banks. We went about 15km up the river, and all along the banks were people tilling thier land, working along the water- making a life for themselves.

There were hundreds of these traditional boats on the river. Similar boats were loaded up with sand that they were dredging from the river and selling for construction. Some of the boats were so loaded down with piles of gravel or sand, it was hard believe they were still floating.

Here is a shot of the park-like grounds of a tomb complex. It is hard to capture the full beauty of these sites, as they were huge and layed out with perfect Feng Shui.

A buddist monk and a communist government official making friendly conversation outside a temple - Vietnam is a land of contrasts.

A couple of men fishing below a temple.

We are soon to be heading out of Hue, and onto Hoi An. We have really loved it here, and feel our next stop will have a hard time living up to this one.

Hue Cool

We've arrived in Hue (pronounced whay), which has recently been given World Heritage Site status by Unesco and with good reason. The city, much smaller than Hanoi, was the capital of Vietnam before the French came in the late 1800's. A river runs right through it, separating the old citadel (about 6 sq miles) which is walled and moated, from the newer city.

We had to cross this bridge to get over to the old citadel to do some exploring. The only reasonable way is by bike, so Stacie mustered up the courage and we rode together in traffic for the first time. Even though things are mellower here in Hue, they still drive Vietnam-style. (she needed a massage later to ease the tension that developed on the road- life is tough)

This is the entry gate after crossing the bridge that welcomes you to the old part of town, which is beautiful, full of gardens and feels very local.

We started out riding around the outside of the walled citadel, and here, Justin is trying to figure out how we get inside. You can see the moat to his left.

After valet parking our bikes (that's how they do it here) and paying a couple of dollars to get in, we were well rewarded. The Imperial City is a walled compound inside the larger Citadel. We wandered around for a few hours, and you could easily find corners of the site without anyone else around. It felt very authentic, and they've done a really good job of keepin' it real.

The citadel is massive, we spent hours walking all over the grounds- in and out of the many structures.



In many cases the only thing left standing of some of the buildings were these arch ways. There were dozens of them In the background what you see is the restoration of one of the buildings.

This man is mixing cement and laying bricks in the preservation/ restoration efforts. Every thing here is done by hand as labor is cheaper than machines.

We've said it before, but we're really loving the food here. Hue has its own unique take on Vietnamese quisine. Less French food, and bit spicier than the north. Yummmm!