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| OneHappy Buda! |
After finishing our amazing breakfast the bus arrived to take us on our tour, we were so excited. We all got on the bus and set off :-). The streets are amazing here in Hue, everywhere you look you see mopeds, motorbikes, scooters and Cyclos (one person carrier type thing), but strangely not many cars...At first the traffic was quite scary and some of the group needed reminding from Cliff as to how dangerous it could be if you were not switched on. How there is not more accidents with other bike type vehicles is difficult to comprehend...it’s the most organised chaos I’ve ever experienced!
Our first trip took about 20 minutes to get to from the hotel; this was a monastery on the banks of the Song River. Not many people were very happy as it was raining and the first thing we saw was a big pile of stairs (Ed. at least 20 steps :-/), but after we got past that we had a great introduction to the culture of Vietnam. The pagoda and tomb was ancient but beautiful. We didn’t have professional tour guides but we did have 3 lovely Vietnamese girls that study English and one of the staff of the hostel giving us a great experience and new knowledge. They explained about the history of the place and told stories. Walking around the temple was a beautiful sight due to the amazing scenery and history.
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| King Glen |
Then back on the bus we went. Before we headed back to the hotel for lunch we went on a Tomb tour (Tu Duc Tomb) which was interesting experience especially when Posner convinced some of us that they kept dead people in the water. The architecture around this tomb was incredible and very peaceful. After our long morning of lovely tours, everyone was quite eager to put some food in their belly’s and head off to the Elephant Springs an hour’s drive away from the centre of Hue.For lunch we decided to give everyone the choice to eat at the hotel restaurant or the restaurant next door. 0nly four of the boys stayed at the hostel while the rest of us ate a delicious meal at the Manderin Cafe. The cafe is owned by Mr Chu who is a photographer and has his worked displayed all around the cafe walls. He sells the photos (for a great price) to his customers (Ed. some of you will be getting these as presents:-) ). The photos are of the beautiful people of Vietnam and the surrounding areas and show some of the unique ways of life. The feelings coming through the faces give the impression of hardship and struggle but contentment too.
Following our Lunch we once again loaded up our hire bus and set off for the Elephant Springs. An hour and a half later we arrived at the springs and walked a short distance to a gorgeous rocky waterfall. Although it was freezing and very slippery we got into the water and enjoyed this beautiful natural pool. Highlights include doubling the slight waterfall as a slide, bombie competitions and some of the boys getting ripped shorts form the rocks with Ellis managing to rip two layers. As we loaded back on to the bus we heard a very feminine squeal. Glen had a small leech attached to his foot. Don’t worry Evans family the only thing hurt was Glen’s ego, which is already big enough to take some hits. This led to a frenzy of the group checking themselves for leeches all carried out on the bus as we travelled. As you can see this was quite eventful as far as bus rides go.
We went back out our lovely hotel for freshening up and then out to dinner at a place called Little Italy (really experiencing the Vietnamese cuisine there guys) where we all tucked into pizza, pastas and burgers. After dinner we headed off to the night markets, where we bought presents and way too many things for ourselves. After a couple games of pool we all retired to our beds and the first English speaking T.V.’s we have encountered.
Over and out,
Cassidy, Allison, Shay, Mikhaila and Cliff xxx (Team effort today folks :-))
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