Splashing our Way Through Hue, Part 1

The morning got off to a good start with a large breakfast buffet at the hotel.

After this, our tour guide Danny, along with our driver, Mr. D, picked us up and took us to our first stop, the Thien Mu pagoda, meaning heavenly lady.

This was the car of Thich Quang Duc, a Buddhist who set himself on fire in 1963 to protest the policies levied against Buddhists at the time.

This is a schedule of a typical day of a monk. Roughly, they wake up and welcome the new day, practice king fu, eat breakfast, study, a few other things (meditation I think is in there), more study and Kung fu practice, entertainment, end the day, then sleep.

After the pagoda, we proceeded to Dong Ba market, taking a dragon boat down the Perfume River to get there. Lots of great looking produce there. One of the big things is raw shrimp in chili and garlic, numerous stalls sold this.

From the market we proceeded to the Imperial Citadel. This was the home to the kings of Vietnam, their families and court officials. Anywhere you see a yellow roof symbolizes places for only the king, which also includes the yellow Noon Gate.

As we professed further in, we learned that much of what was contained in the citadel was destroyed from war damage, and they are working to reconstruct all the lost buildings, something they hope to have done in the next 15 years.

Along the way, we got to see a lot of the traditional art and architecture throughout.

More in part two.