So we had been told by every guide book and trip advisor about various scams, but up until now had managed to avoid any difficulties. Yes of course the people in the restaurants make you pay different prices to the locals but you kind of accept that. Hue changed our thinking in this respect. The topic became more present somehow for us after our experience in the hotel (Walls so thin I could have sworn they were made of rice paper).
[NOTE: Another pet hate of mine is “parking”, but that’s a story for a different day.]

After arriving from Danang we got off and pick up our bags. As we wanted to clarify the continuation of our journey for the next day so we spoke to the man in the Sinh Tourist office. He took a little bit but hooked us up with a slight modification to our trip, a slight detour to Dong Hoi for a visit to the caves near there. We were then sort of grunted at by a young guy with a piece of paper saying “Stefanie” – bingo we thought, a welcoming committee! Although we hadn’t actually requested a pick up. The young guy then waved down a taxi, which took us maybe 100 metres. As we were a bit unsure about the situation we thought the taxi was on the house, it was after all a little over 50 cents. Upon checking out the next day the lady of the house informed us that the room was $15 and pickup $3. Cheeky monkey, especially as we had explicitly written an email saying we didn’t need a pickup and could walk as we had checked the distance from bus to hotel before travelling to Hue. I’m not even going to get into the fact that the hotel wasn’t worth the $15. More like $10 max!

Hue was at one time the capital of Vietnam, therefore it’s full of massive buildings and palaces for royalty. One of which is the citadel, including the forbidden city, a space reserved for royalty. Another building we managed to visit was the tomb of the emperor,  which is a mix of his summer house and his resting place. It’s a but outside the city, so we rented bikes and managed the 30 min ride quite well. Along the way we encountered some “parking” and some kids shouting hello, Vietnamese kids love to do that. One little girl even gave Steffi a flower, very cute.

Some of the historic buildings have been destroyed in the American war, but the architecture still remains and the engineering behind the construction of the citadel, the main attraction in Hue is quite amazing. Here is the layout from above. Sadly for us the weather took a turn for the worse and it rained or drizzled most of the afternoon cutting short our tour of the city. Next it was off to pick up our bags and make or way to the bus, this time we walked the 100 metres.

Lake and gardens at emperor's tomb

Throne

Actual resting place of emperor

Entrance to amazing citadel

These fish love a good feed

Start of grounds of forbidden city