Day 7 Hue to Danang and Hoi An

We started the day by visiting Thien Mu Pagoda (Heavenly Lady Pagoda) built over 400 years ago.  It was set in front of beautiful gardens, water gardens, a temple and smaller pagoda dedicated to a Monk.  There is a Vietnamese monastery here and we saw a few monks going about their daily routine.  There is also a small museum dedicated to a Monk named Thich Quang Duc who drove an 1956 Austin A95 car from Thien Mu to Saigon and then burned himself to death in June 1963 in protest of the way monks were persecuted by the South Vietnamese Government.

 
Thien Mu Pagoda

 
The Temple


 
The Water Garden

 
Thich Quang Duc - Buddhist monk who 
burned himself to death in Saigon

 
The Austin A95car driven from her to Hanoi by Thich Quang Duc


We then went to a temple commemorating the Vietnamese who died during WWI. Although Vietnam was not involved in this war, the country were under French Colonial rule and the French sent Vietnamese men to France to fight and many were killed.

 
Column alongside the temple

 
Temple in remembrance of those killed in WWI


Finally we saw the school where Ho Chi Min studied around 1908.

 
Ho Chi Min's former school

We were taken to Hue railway station where we boarded the train to Da Nang on the Reunification Line which is very scenic and goes through 3 mountain passes giving some lovely views of the coastline although these were very difficult to photograph as the telegraph wires were usually in the way and there were a lot of trees blocking the view.  Breaks in the trees were few and far between but quite spectacular when they did occur.  The journey took 3 hours and was quite an experience.




We were met at Da Nang by our coach and driven to our hotel in nearby Hoi An.  Before leaving Da Nang we stopped to take photos of the Dragon Bridge.

 
Da Nang Dragon Bridge

 
Dragons Head at end of bridge

After checking into our hotel and having an afternoon swim we went to a local restaurant which was about 1.5 km walk away but gave us the chance to see just how lively this town is at nightime.  The streets of the old town are shut to traffic from 4 pm and there are street traders, restaurants, bars and hundreds of tourists.  This part of the town is decorated with illuminated chinese style lanterns.  There are tourist boats with these lanterns that offer short round trips on the river and they were sailing continuously and looked amazing as they followed each other along the river.

 
The riverside at Hoi An

 
Decorated bridge

 
Town sign

 
Church in town

 
Tourist boats sailing in convoy along the river



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