Day 246 - An afternoon in Hue

We woke to one of the frustations that comes with catching Open Tour buses in Vietnam - the bus stopping outside of town at one of the bus driver's 'brother's' hotels! The driver and hotel owner got a little annoyed when everyone refused to get off the bus asking to be taken into town! It wasn't really an issue for us because we were just going to get back on another bus to go to Hue! On the way to Hue, we stopped for a snack and another photo-op:
The drawcard for Hue is that is was once the capital of the country under the rule of the Nguyen Emperors, and after the successive wars Hue and its architecture was badly damaged. We arrived in Hue about 5 hours later and after checking into a hotel we set off for lunch and to explore the Citadel. The walls that surround the citadel are 2m thick and 10km long and were constructed in 1804. At the front of the citadel is a 37m high flag tower, the largest in Vietnam and during the Viet Cong occupation in 1968 the National Liberation Flag flew in defiance. Inside we wandered around the gates, temples and pagodas, which varied from newly restored to partly crumbled, to almost non-existent.
Almost at the end of our afternoon we came across s a martial arts team doing a performance outside a temple. We got to see a lion dance and a little dude who's bound to be able to break some bones when he grows up! Our night was filled with eating, drinking, and sleeping.

Adlibing it inside the Citadel.