Tomb Raiding – Huế, Central Vietnam

Reposted from my old blog.

April 15 Day 2 

We were supposed to arrive around 9:30am but we got there maybe an hour late. I didn’t expect to see my hotel pickup anymore. And I was right. No one was there to pick me up. But it was okay, I approached a green Mai Linh taxi and showed him the address to Than Thien Hotel. In a few minutes we were there and I paid only 30.000 VND. I swore to myself when I get back to Hanoi I won’t ride a tuktuk again lol. The hotel was great! But more on that on a separate post. I decided to start my tour after 1pm. I arranged it at the reception desk and got a package to visit 3 tombs and the Thien Mu Pagoda for $15 USD.

Tomb of Kai Dinh 

There were a few people when I got there. The place itself is small and a few minutes is enough to go around. The tomb itself is impressive though. Just look at the photos below. I didn’t have to stay more than 15 minutes there but then I happened to ask this English guy ( who I saw was taking his own photo using the timer haha) to take my photo. He was looking at the photo he took of me and said something’s wrong with my camera. I realized that too cos my shots were too dark but then I attributed that to weather and the absence of the sun. So I told him it could either be the setting on my camera or the weather. He was trying to correct the setting, I was kinda worried cause I know he was using Canon and mine was Nikon and I thought he’d have a hard time but he was kind enough to give me a 20 minute impromptu photography tutorial. Can’t remember his name now, I’m bad with names. ^^ This is what’s nice about travelling solo though, meeting people otherwise you would never have met in your life.

Tomb of Minh Mang

This has got to be my favorite amongst the Royal Tombs. The tomb is actually located inside a forest. It was already late in the afternoon, the cool wind was blowing, I had the place all to myself. Just me, the birds, the trees, the setting sun, and the ancient place. It was calm and peaceful. I loved it. If I wasn’t pressed for time, I wanted to spend an entire lazy afternoon there. I imagined if I was a local Vietnamese girl, this is where I’d go for a date, have some picnic by the lake or something. Except, the entrance fee cost 80.000 VND. But yeah.

More photos of Minh Mang Tomb: 

Tomb of Tu Duc

The driver actually suggested that we skip Tu Duc and try two other places instead since what I’d see there is almost the same as the other two tombs. I didn’t want to skip anything on my IT however since I didn’t wanna have regrets later on so I told him I’d rather drop by. I guess the reason why he wanted me to skip it was primarily because the area was huge and he knew it’d take me a long time to see it. And it was getting really late. Well, he was right too but I still wanted to see it for myself .

Thien Mu Pagoda

Entrance to this one is surprisingly free. It offers a stunning view of the Perfume River and if you’re a fan of Rage Against The Machine, you’re in for a treat. The car on the cover of their first album is housed inside. So cool when history and music collide.

After the tour, the driver offered to bring me to two more Pagoda for 80.000 VND. He was really nice so I thought might as well anyway.

Bao Quoc Pagoda

This is where I met my first real monk and had a photo with him too! He was just sitting there on the hood of his bike in front of this gate almost as if waiting for this moment to arrive hahhaah! That’s just me being melodramatic. But hey, the driver knew they leave at that hour so it was just perfect timing. Such a surreal experience. He was so cool 🙂

Tu Dam Pagoda

We were done shortly after 5pm. He drove me back to the hotel but dropped me off at a restaurant right across it since I told him I need someplace to eat. He gave me his contact information and I told him to set up an email address if he want people to contact him directly. I knew he was only getting a small cut off what we pay the hotel. I guess he had no idea how but he said he’s ask one of his daughters to do it for him. I asked him to order for me to save me the chore of ordering for myself. I asked him to stay but I guess he had to get back to his family. The food was great by the way, although I don’t know what it’s called.

I went back to the hotel, backed up my photos and decided to rest before I head out again to check out Truong Tien bridge. I’ve read about how it changes color and I wanna capture it on film. I didn’t realize however that they shut it off at 8pm haha. I got there at half past 8 so all I saw was a bridge in the dark lol. I had a nice walk going there though so it was okay. I tried looking for the night market they told me about at the hotel but I couldn’t find it. I tried asking to no avail. I didn’t wanna draw attention to myself waving my map around so I gave up and called it a night. There were some souvenirs being sold beside the river and I was thinking that could be it anyway. On the way back to the hotel, I bought some local breads. I love breads.

To be continued: 😉