Hue the Imperial city

Our hotel was just around the corner from this amazing site. Whilst queuing for entering tickets, we were acosted by young school children, accompanied by their teacher. Clearly they were tasked with finding British tourists with whom to speak Englisheach had a list of questions to ask: do you like milk? How old are you? Why do you like milk. Then we were asked to pose for photos and we got hugs.

We spent the morning strolling through the Palace and gardens.

Following description courtesy of Wikipedia.

The Imperial City (Vietnamese: Hoàng thành; chữ Hán: 皇城) is a walled enclosure within the citadel (Kinh thành; chữ Hán: 京城) of the city of Huế, the former imperial capital of Vietnam during the Nguyễn dynasty. It contains the palaces that housed the imperial family, as well as shrines, gardens, and villas for mandarins. Constructed in 1803 under Emperor Gia Long as a new capital.

The Nguyen lasted quite a bit but after their first 35 years the French invaded and kept them as a puppet government for the centre and the north

The central gate, the emperor palace, the secret purple city. Impressive and very hierarchical similar to the Chinese or Korean system of emperor administration.

But a trip without bbq is not a trip so when we saw a spit turning with an interesting mechanism we had to make a stop.

In the evening we went to a local place we noticed on our way the previous evening Quán Nhâu 36, and tried fried snails, Tom nuong (grilled prawns) bo bau pho and our reliable Huda bier. Busy relaxed Delicious

Then an early start in preparation for the 5.30 am train to Ninh Binh, a journey of 11 hours.