12th Ocotber

So our sleeper train arrived back in Hanoi at abut 6am and we quickly realised that we had to wait until 7pm the same evening to catch our sleeper bus to Hue. Found a nice little hotel that let us pay less to stay there until about 4.30pm so we could sleep some more and freshen up - money well spent!! We raced around Hanoi one last time - visiting the temple on Hoan Kiem Lake and trying out some more street food - until we finally boarded our sleeper bus.

Now 'sleeper buses' they should not be called!! Hard to accurately describe but it's basically a bus with three rows of two storey bunk beds. For the more vertically challenged people of the world (myself included) it is fine, however, Paul found it a bit of a squeeze. Luckily the bus wasn't full so we had our pick of the beds. 20 minutes into the journey this quickly changed as I tired of feeling like I was going to go straight through the windscreen everytime the bus slammed on the brakes. So we moved down to the bottom, got out the ipods and settled down for the night.

Despite sleep being sporadic - the journey went by pretty quickly and we found ourselves in sunny Hue at 8am the next morning.

13th Ocotber

As we stepped off the bus we were greeted by a smiling gentleman holiding up a sign with our names on - talk about service - we were then taxi'ed to our hotel where we had to wait a few more hours before we could check in! The hotel staff we so friendly - offering us cups of tea all the time and wanting to chat. We also notice that, like other parts of Vitenam, there are a lots of dogs about (not stray - they did have owners) so that amused Paul for an hour or two. We finally check into out room and are impressed by the rose petals on the bed and plush TV - bargain considering we only paid 13 squid a night!

We spent the evening just wandering around the many restuirants and bars and found one place selling beers for 5000 dong a piece - about 18p! We promtply get them in and are accosted by the two girls working there who want to know where we are from, are we boyfriend and girlfriend etc. After finally making our excuses to leave that place went for an Indian before heading home.

14th October

We'd booked a boat tour the previous night so it was up early to grab some breakfast (baguette with jam or eggs again). We were greeted by two men on moped's at our hotel and were like WTF ….. they had indeed come to pick us p to take us to the boat! So we got to experience our first ever ride on the back of a moped - Scary stuff!! No helmets for a start, and they played cat and mouse with each while weaving in an out of the oncoming traffic!!! Still, Paul was loving it and it ahs now whetted his appetite for hiring one of our own - think we may try it in Nha Trang where the roads are a little quieter!

So we boarded our 'Dragon boat' and there was quite an eclectic mix of people on the boat (Germany, Japan, Spain). We later got chatting to a couple our age from London who we found out were staying at our hotel also. First stop was some Pagoda (I forget the name as we have seen so many over the last month or so) - our guide for the day was very animated but he knew his stuff so it was nice to really find out about the place. We then went to some small garden house to watch some Vietnamese Kung Fu, which was created in retaliation to Chinese Kung Fu (old enemies the Vietnamese and the Chinese!!), well cool - very different in style actually and we got some really good videos. Only a fleeting visit though as we then went back to the boat and it was off down the river to see the Tomb of Minh Mang - the most majestic of tombs in central Vietnam. By this time however it had started to rain, you could see the stonking great black clouds roll in. Being on the river meant we could see it was, at times, raining on one side of the boat but not on the other which was weird. We stopped at another pagoda before lunch but decide not to pay to go in as all our pagoda trips seemed to be merging into one :o). Lunch was basic, Rice, Noodles and sautéed veg but was good that it was included in the trip - and plus, I was freaking starving and starting to moan !!

In the afternoon we headed to see a few more tombs, equally as impressive, and dating back to times that are unfathomable and we finally get dropped off back in the centre of town. We head on back to the hotel to chill and end up going to a nice little café in the evening to meet Rachel (from out tour in China). Was so good catching up and we end the night with drinks at her (comparatively) plus hotel complete with swimming pool (We missed a trick there Rach!).

15th October

Last full day in Hue - the weather was still a little dodgy and raining on and off. Still we hire bikes (1$ a day - crazy prices) and explore the rest of city. We end up parking the bikes and having a wander around the citadel - a large inner city dating back to the 18th Century. Was a huge place and a lot of the tombs / places of worship has been restored to a high standard but it was also nice to see ruins of some complexes so we could actually see how they had weathered over the years! We then headed back out and cycled round the city wall, which was hard at times when we had random Vietnamese locals drive alongside us on their mopeds striking up a conversation …"where you frooommm……this your girlfriend" and so on.

After dropping off the bikes we stop by and internet café (which turns into an epic 3 hour stint, while we try and set up this blog and catch up on posts!!) and then head to a bar called DMZ, as we'd been there the night before. Good tunes, great food and a free pool table - and every spare inch of the place was covered in messages from travelers - so we left our mark upstairs by the pool table - good times!