Going North

Starting this journey in Danang – a nice surprise after Nha Trang, although still so many highrise’s and very spread out, but somehow with a much nicer ambience about it.  But as with everywhere development is taking away the character like this lovely old temple building below.

Our first trip is into Son Tra Nature Reserve to find the rare Red-shanked Douc Langur – which luckily our guide new how to find – the only other tourist we saw was someone on a grab motorbike who only saw the Langur’s as were already taking photos when he went past.  Some things just need a specialist or as in his case luck.

While out for an evening stroll and to find dinner we saw lots of bicycles cycling along loaded with food and live fires, like a mobile BBQ.

We thought we could get better photographs in next town, but they were not any where else. Funny how each town has it’s own little quirks.

Moving to Hoi An – although very close in km’s it is so far apart in both visual and sensual.  (Apart from the fact that between the 2 towns there are just wall to wall new massive highrise buildings along the coast so it will not be the same for long). Great little place to just wander and look at the colour, so many lovely lanterns and other stuff. 

The narrow streets with old colonial style buildings are very photogenic – if you are any good at that which we are not.

Walking around town on the first night there was a concert in the town centre, we stopped to have a look and were informed the singer was Vietnam’s number 1 female singer.  I liked the smoke bubbles.

A trip out to UNESCO My Son Sanctuary was the highlight here with temples built between the 4th and 13th centuries – but sadly many were ruined for various reasons.  What is still standing is worth visiting and the grounds are also great for birds and scenery.

From Danang we take the train to Hue – bit of a stuff up here as the train buff (Steve) managed to miss the fact that there is a heritage train which actually stops at the famous Hai Van Pass for tourists to take photos.  Instead we were on the commuter train where everyone in the carriage shut the curtains and although we kept ours open the reflection from the persons curtain in front (same window) meant pretty bad photos. 

Still it was an incredibly scenic journey – although again one of the lovely bays has been flattened and looks as if it will be a whole new town.

Hue a very different city again being the old capital of Vietnam, there are so many grand buildings – but very spread out so unless you pass in a car you would need to put in some serious effort to see many.  Hue sits on the Perfume River which was initially named as many flowers used to drop into it and float down river creating an amazing smell.  Unfortunately most of the upriver forest is now gone so the effect is not really apparent anymore.

A walk around the UNESCO Historic Imperial City (the citadel) found us a couple of new birds we missed in other places – bonus.

The main building is amazing and the grounds are just lovely.

There are 3 royal tombs that can be visited,  Minh Mang, born in 1791 and dying in 1841 (49), reigned for 21 years.  He was certainly a busy man with 43 wives and 142 children – not sure how he found the time to reign. Minh Mang was the second emperor of the Nguyen Dynasty.  His tomb took 3 years to build.

Tu Duc was the 4th emperor, born in 1829 and died in 1883 at 54. Tu Duc reigned for 36 years and he also had a number of wives and concubines – 250 of them, but he was unable to father children.  His tomb also took about 3 years to build. On the way to tomb we went through a  village that just makes incense, very colourfull.

Tu Duc must have been a tiny man going on the size of his throne.

Khai Dinh’s tomb on the other hand took 11 years to build.  Khai Dinh was born in 1885 and died in 1925 at 40 after reigning for 9 years and was the 12th Emperor.

Two things Steve wanted to do in Hanoi was see the shot down B52 in a lake. Shot down by Vietnamese forces in 1972. Which according to the sign significantly contributed to the end of the war.

Second thing was Train Street, off we go get seat at little expensive Cafe, Carol said not as close as train in Darjeeling. Then train came along and it was so close you could touch it, quite a memorable experience.

Biggest change in Hanoi we noticed was more cars  than there was in 2003, also traffic lights and lights for crossing roads. Red means 100% chance of getting run over Green means 90% chance of getting run over. All a bit dodgy as vehicles come at you from every angle and ignore lights.