For some reason I was expecting Hue to be a quaint coastal town with a small castle but I must’ve mis-read the comprehensive notes we were given.  It is actually a large and very modern city some 750km south of Hanoi and was the capital until 1945.

It is divided in two by the Perfume river – (because it smells, of course) – (yes, in a good way) – (lotus blossom in summer actually) – (stop asking so many questions) and, on the northern bank, is Thien Mu Pagoda, the main symbol of the city.

Further along the river is the Imperial Citadel, ancient home to the Emperors of the Nguyen dynasty of Vietnam.

It is huge. A city within the city, protected by an outer wall almost 11km long plus a moat and inner walls that divide it into the Forbidden City and the Imperial city.

It’s a vast and very impressive citadel with Palaces for generations of Emperors, their families, their wives, their concubines and the mandarins.

It was constructed as the Capital City in 1803 under Emperor Gia Long and 13 Nguyen Emperors ruled from here until the imposition of the French Protectorate in the 1880s and then it became mainly symbolic until the Nguyen dynasty was ousted in 1945 and Vietnam became a republic. 

History lesson over, (phew, I hear you say) except for the interesting fact that these Emperors had so many children, by so many concubines, that over 40% of the population of Vietnam now has the family name of Nguyen.

Imagine roll-call at school – Nguyen? ‘Here Sir’,  Nguyen? ‘Here Sir’, Nguyen? ‘Here Sir’, Nguyen?, Nguyen?, Where’s Nguyen? ‘He’s ill today sir!’ Okay, Nguyen? ‘Here Sir’, etc etc.

We were then taken on a cyclo-tour which was quite embarrassing. I felt we were two old people being taken out for rides in our wheelchairs.

Plus it’s a bit hair-raising being propelled at the front of a wheelchair through the Vietnamese traffic, it’s not exactly safe. 

Talking of which, there’s a reason that a safe is called a safe isn’t there? The clue is in the name you would think.

Whenever I check into a hotel, before going out I always dump everything in the safe to keep it all, err, safe.

However, this is the second hotel we have stayed at where the safe isn’t. It’s not bolted down, you can just pick it up and off you go, as I shall now demonstrate…

More plate art-

Strange things…

Having eaten so much healthy food we were starting to crave carbs (or at least I was).

Many of you will know that, since buying a pizza oven last year, I’ve become a bit of a pizza afficianado/pizza bore (delete as you think appropriate). The same goes for sourdough bread (My starter has a name and travels with me), plus I’m partial to a fruity blonde, so when Brigitte spotted a micro brewery serving sourdough pizza we jumped in a taxi, waved our dongs in his face (yey, you were missing the dong jokes weren’t you?) and 50,000 later (about £1.70) we arrived at The Imperial Craft Bia Brewpub.

It’s owned and run by a Californian called Sean and his wife, Hằng, two very enthusiastic and bubbly characters.

They even use the yeast from their strawberry IPA as their sourdough pizza starter, which is interesting to me but probably not for you, apologies.

Suffice to say, delicious pizza, the pineapple IPA was very tasty and we have re-carbed our bodies.

Also I got to further my mission and interrogated Sean on the Communism thing.

He was very enthusiastic about it all – and he’s an American – he’s the enemy here surely?

He set up his micro brewery six years ago, married Hằng, the business is doing well, there’s many local entrepreneurs, people are encouraged to better themselves and the people in general are really happy and feel the country is prospering.

He’s expanding his business and loves being in Vietnam.

I’m going to check the photos that I took of him to see if I can spot any hidden electrodes protruding from his head. It’s all so strange, communism is definitely, definitely, bad, right?

Onto the fruit quiz…,

Congratulations Anna you are today’s winner! You won by three minutes – so well worth getting up early to enter! 🤣

Yes, it was a Persimmon fruit, very popular in Vietnam snd China.

Today’s Fruit quiz..

I thought I’d set a tougher challenge today…

Please note, no cheating- if you are using Google reverse lookup to identify the fruit, then I have a very particular set of skills. Skills I have acquired over a very long career. Skills that make me a nightmare for people like you, if you stop now that will be the end of it, I will not look for you, I will not pursue you, but if you don’t, then my bots will hunt down your bots and kill them! ©️2008 Liam Neeson -ish 🤣.

Tomorrow morning it’s an early pick-up and we’re off to Hoi An via Danang.

Hue – 18th November 2024