One Day in Hue: June 23rd

After two exhausting yet rewarding weeks of service work, we hit the road to spend our last week touring the central and southern regions of Vietnam. Our first stop was Hue, which was capital of Vietnam from 1802 to 1945. We started off the morning with a visit to the Tomb of Tu Duc. The Emperor Tu Duc designed his tomb himself and lived there for the last few years of his life. The grounds of the tomb contained temples, a palace where he lived, a tea house next to a lake filled with lotus flowers, and a forest. Being there was a refreshing break from the emotionally draining visits to war sites. During our visit, we learned a lot from the history and architecture of Vietnam from the 19th century. 

Lunch was a pleasant surprise as Truc took us to Mandarin Cafe, owned by Mr. Cu, who is Truc's close friend and an awesome photographer! We enjoyed a delicious meal with Western options, as well as Vietnamese cuisine. As half of our group munched on much-needed hamburgers, we flipped through Mr. Cu's beautiful photos of Hue. After lunch, we couldn't stop ourselves from purchasing many of his photos, while ordering desserts such as fried bananas and fruit pancakes with ice cream. 

After lunch, we headed into the citadel, which makes up most of the city of Hue.  Our hotel was located inside the citadel, which was a unique opportunity. Our first stop in the citadel was the Imperial Closure, which was a citadel within a citadel. This was where the emperors resided. We saw beautiful temples, pagodas, and palaces. We were amazed by the beautiful architecture, especially with the gates. Then, we entered the Forbidden Purple City, which is the center of the Imperial Closure. In this area featured the Royal Theatre where we hoped to see a traditional performance. However, it was closed due to a visit by the UNESCO delegation. We were extremely disappointed (especially Truc!), we continued touring the remains of the Forbidden Purple City. 

We spent our free and only night in Hue crossing the Trang Tien Bridge which was lit up with a variety of beautiful changing colors, including maize and blue. Once we crossed the bridge we explored coffee shops and the night market.