Today it rained. We have reflected on the forthcoming 22-hour bus journey to Ho Chi Minh City and decided we just can’t hack it. The first overnight leg from Hanoi to Hue was bad enough, so sod it, we’re going to splash out and spend £40 to fly! (That’s for two tickets.) We book the flights for Thursday and the flight time is only 1 hour 10 minutes – that’s more like it! After sorting out our travel arrangements we have some lunch and then go for a walk around the sites of the old town. It’s necessary to buy a ticket to visit any of the historic places here such as old houses, museums, assembly halls and temples. For 75,000 Dong (£3) the ticket gives access to six of the sites. Our first choice is the Handicraft Centre which is housed in the 200-year-old trading house of a Chinese merchant and alone is worth the ticket price. There is a fascinating cultural performance of traditional Vietnamese music which includes dancing, singing and opera and the opportunity to look round the workshops where artisans are producing pottery, silk pictures, carvings, paintings, bags, shoes and an assortment of other handicrafts. From here we visit the Cantonese Assembly Hall and the covered Japanese bridge. We stop in a bar for a beer and bump into the Dutch/Danish couple we met on the trip to Halong Bay! They are leaving this evening for HCMC and onto Sydney, Tahiti and Patagonia – so I don’t think there’s much chance of our paths crossing again.
The Japanese covered bridge is a wonderful structure – a small wooden bridge spanning a tributary of the Thu Bon River. This arched bridge was originally built by the Japanese community of Hoi An in order to link them with the Chinese quarters across the stream. The entrances to the bridges are guarded by a pair of dogs on one side and a pair of monkeys on the other and there is a small temple on the bridge itself.
The Cantonese Assembly Hall was founded in 1746 and is typically Chinese in its decoration, with a dragon fountain, red and gold banners and lanterns and some very intricate carving on the wooden beams that support the roof in front of the main entrance.