20th-21st September - Hue - Citadel - back to Ho Chi Minh City

Sunday 20^th September 2015

Our last day in Hue was spent in the Citadel, the old imperial city.  It was very much destroyed during the war…

There were heartbreaking photos of the devastation.

Now it is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and it is being lavishly and meticulously restored.

It was wonderful to get out of the blazing hot sun and to walk along the cool colonnades.

We were also very happy to find a café just outside the walls, where we could sit in the shade and wonder at the golden sheep (?) goats (?) watching us from protective positions.

We are now back at Ben and Rose’s in Ho Chi Mink City after an action-packed five days – Dalat, Danang, Hue.  Marble mountains, waterfalls, silk, flowers, coffee, deep-fried crickets, war zones, tunnels, trains, buses, taxis, planes, trishaws, dragons galore, temples – so many experiences, all swirling around in my brain…

Monday 21^st September

Not so sure if 66 is an auspicious number…TWO Devil Numbers together… But yes it is a privilege to reach 66 happy and healthy if not particularly wise…

My darling computer and iPhone were the very first to wish me happy birthday…so funny, how attached you can get, to a small bit of hard and software… Ah but not quite true – I did get a message, a day early from Angela in the Maldives – Tasmanians are SO global!  And it did of course make me even happier than the message from my MacBook Air…

I just have to include this photo of this Hue toddler, intent upon washing and squeezing a bucketload of eels...

I am sitting in the dear little local coffee shop around the corner from Ben and Rose’s.  They no longer have tiny plastic chairs which stick to your bottom, as they did in 2009.  There are comfy cane chairs, and WiFi connection, and a nice power point to charge our electronic items.

This morning we are going into town for a big treat – a visit to the dentist for Pete, who has lost a crown.  (Well it isn’t lost; it is rapped in a hanky in his shorts pocket…but it is lost from its rightful position in his head!)

Next stop – this big market, to buy coffee for 3XS.  And tonight we are going to beautiful Hai Tuc restaurant, with a group of our expat friends.  Life is good, even at 66…