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After Halong Bay it was time to explore the central part of Vietnam and we flew from Hanoi to the old imperial city of Hué. Our guided trip took us to the old royal city, the royal tomb of Tu Duc and the Thien Mu Pagoda.
To our surprise the Thien Mu Pagoda houses the blue Austin used by the monk Thick Quang to drive to Saigon in 1963 and set himself on fire as a protest against the Diem Regime supported by the Americans. The famous picture of the monk on fire is shown in the front window of the car and on the wall behind it. If still in doubt of how it looks - just find your old Rage Against the Machine CD and you'll see the pic on the front cover.
From Hué we drove towards Hoi An passing through the fast developing casino city Danang with its impressive resorts. We finally reached the old trading port Hoi An, which stands in contrast to Danang being a slow paced city where time almost seem to be standing still. It is not allowed for scooters or cars to drive around the old city center and we really enjoyed the silence and beautiful architecture of the old houses and narrow streets.
My Son ruins build by the old Cham dynasty. Sadly most of the ruins have been destroyed by the intensive bombings of the Americans during the Vietnam War.
We joined the Red Bridge Cooking Class at one of our few days off from sight seeing and being the best student in class I had to show the others how to cook genuine Vietnamese cuisine ;-)
