Motorbikes, royal tombs and a pagoda

Our bus into Hue arrived late this morning, but some guys from our hostel were still there to meet us. We were a little groggy from the train journey and it took a minute before we could comprehend that they wanted to take us back to the hostel on the back of motorbikes! This was Tam's first time, but I had already experienced the madness of rush hour on a motorbike in Hanoi - crazy! Despite this, we arrived safely and were greeted with a refreshing cold drink and some scrumptous breakfast! As our room wasn't ready yet we ventured out into the city for a look around and to plan what we would do for our one full day and two half days here. This was harder than you would imagine! But eventually we figured our plans out and headed back to the hostel to freshen up.

We decided that the cheapest and easiest way to see the royal tombs outside the city that afternoon was on xe om (motorbike!). So after grabbing some helmets, we got on the back of two motorbikes and zoomed out of the city. Overall, the four hours we spent being driven around were a little hair raising - speeding down tiny dirt tracks, through some back of beyond villages, near misses with other vehicles etc. But so much fun! The ride was actually more interesting than some of the tombs!

But anyway, the tombs... two pretty standard with some nice grounds and limited information, and one awesome one with a Gaudi-esque ceiling! Then we paid a quick call to a pagoda, which was nice. As you can probably tell, we were a little underwhelmed in general.

After returning safe and sound, we headed over to our new favourite restaurant The DMZ Bar for dinner. YUM! We have a very early start tomorrow morning so it is time for bed now - rock 'n' roll!

Jo xxx