Hue, train drinking and Halong Bay

We left Hoi An by bus and arrived at the old imperial capital of Hue before lunchtime. E and I rented bikes to venture to the old citadel. Built for the last dynasty which ended in 1945, this large complex was designed to replicate the Forbidden City in Vietnam. It was ruined in wars and natural disasters in the 40's and 60's so lots of it was using your imagination but some of the main palace buildings were still quite impressive.

After surviving rush hour traffic to get back, we prepped for dinner at the DMZ bar (oh yeah the old DMZ line is really close to here too) and enjoyed food and well a lot of drinks. The night involved a drink called a Skittle Bomb, the longest and worst pool game between four people ever, E and I leaving our mark in the form of a signed Qatari riyal on the wall and gently being reminded its time to go well after the music was off and all chairs were on the tables.

So needless to say, the next mornings chill morning became sleep in all morning and watch movies til we left at 2. I think Erika needs these days since we are still in the de-compressing stage after her separation. And we have Brett, our tour guy, calling her Agent 28 as he's convinced she's a spy (our hesitancy to answer work questions led to that).  Although our train to Hanoi was an hour late, we soon were in our familiar cabins for the long haul. Our Danish bunk mates are a good pair and make it a fun ride. Then we amped up the fun by starting season 5 of Californication on Brett's computer while mixing up the best Vietnamese sugar cane rum ever with coke.  After finishing the bottle, we moved on to beer and Borat. And after those beers ran out, Brett and I went on another beer run which involved going up and down the entire length of train looking for the one beer cart man all the while stepping over sleeping legs and realizing our basic cabins are quite luxurious compared to the rest of the train  we are in.  We eventually discovered that the beer cart man was sleeping but we were coming to a stop soon. There, we had about three minutes to disembark, find cold beers, load our bags up and get back on before the trains pulls away. Though it may have been a good story one day, having myself and the tour guide stranded at a random train station with a bag of beers would've been disastrous so thankfully we made it back on and continued with The Daily Show before finally calling it a night.

When we had to disembark at 4 am, I definitely was in a fog but then we fell back asleep on a 3 hr bus to Halong Bay and finally again at our hotel. We meet at noon to head to the pier to board our junk boat (which wasn't junky at all, it was very nice!) for our lunch boat ride through the magnificent limestone carst formations. It's very similar to Guilin in China which actually is only about a days bus ride away. Though it was quite foggy, the eerie views were amazing. After a cave visit which was equally impressive we napped on the boat ride back (so I have now slept on a train, bus, bed and boat all in the past 24 hours).

It was a wonderful boat ride but I'd love to come back when there's better weather and stay overnight out on the boat!