Hue
Since I left our arrival in Hue out of yesterday’s post, let me start there. The city (at least the part where we are staying) is pretty much everything Hanoi was not – namely quiet, and not very crowded. As we arrived quite late, we stay fairly close to the hotel, but the streets are full of stores and restaurants, and we can pretty much walk wherever we want since motorbikes and cars are few and far between. We find a good Indian restaurant just a few doors down, so have a nice dinner there before turning in for the night.
Today is the only actual day that we have set aside to see Hue. From all we have been able to gather from those that have been here before us, it is a very nice city, but with only a few must do items. Given that, we plan on cramming as much as we can into about 12 hours, and then hit the road again tomorrow to Hoi An.
Like Hanoi, there are cyclos everywhere, and we decide to take a driver (two actually, as while the seats may accommodate two Vietnamese, 
they only hold one North American) up on his offer to pedal us around for 5 hours for the princely sum of $5. It turns out to be a pretty comfortable way to travel and let’s us cover ground quite a bit quicker than we could on foot. Knowing how the kids like to ride bikes, I get the mental image of them taking me to work while I read the paper. Can’t imagine why they would object.
Hue is the old capital from when Emperors still ruled Vietnam, and from that time, the most notable sight is the Citadel – the walled compound where the Emperor and his court lived. Most of it is gone now, due in large part to bombing from the Vietnam War (or the American War as they refer to it here), but work is underway to rebuild it. Based on the number of workers on site, less those that were laying down sleeping, the project looks to be on schedule for completion in about 400 years.
We also see one of the old Pagodas on the edge of town and spend a little time at the central market. Both are good, but after 4 years of traveling to Asia, we find one temple blurring into the next and the cramped stalls of hanging carcasses less and less novel. The lady cutting her toenails right next to the food she was selling was a bit of a new twist though.
By the end of the “tour” we are pretty beat, so head back to the hotel for a break. We forgot the sunscreen in the morning, so a paying the price a little for that. It was mostly overcast, but the sun poked through enough to burn my nose, and I look a little like Toucan Sam as a result.
Once things cooled off a bit, we headed back out for a walk and to find some street snacks. The fruit smoothie stand seemed promising, so we pointed at a few things that looked good and let them go to work. The recipe looked pretty simple, as everything we picked just went into a dirty blender. To that, they added a shot of water from an old Tupperware jug. Ang’s eyes grew two sizes at that, so when they asked about ice, she tried to wave them off. But you can’t get a little a bit pregnant, and since the water was already in, the ice wasn’t going to do any more damage. All this they pour into a plastic bag and snap a rubber band around the top to keep it shut.
On an unrelated note, Ang is learning to be a really good sharer this trip, and she let me drink most of the smoothie.
The one stop we didn’t get to make was the royal tombs outside of town. If we had one more day here, there is a boat you can take down the river to see them. But we’re a little too beat to try and cram such a trip into the late afternoon, so add it to the list of things to see if our travels bring us this way again. Same for the DMZ and Khe Sanh, which are about an hour out of town.
We make arrangements through our hotel for a car to take us to Hoi An in the morning (a three hour drive or so), and head off for dinner at a Vietnamese restaurant across the street. We’re definitely in the home stretch now, and in many ways, Sunday is coming much too quickly (although we are both very anxious to see the boys).