A trip that came highly recommend proved to be one of the better days out despite seeing yet more pagodas – as if we hadn’t seen enough already!

The trip saw us boarding a dragon boat and spending the day cruising along the perfume river visiting pagodas and mausoleums.

The trip got off to a rocky start when the boat girl came around with the lunch menu and all dishes cost 40,000VND – more than we’d paid for the trip – plus lunch was supposed to be included. When challenged she said lunch was included but all we got was rice and peas. Along with most of the rest of the group we refused to pay extra and opted for rice and peas!

After 20 minutes cruising through scenery we could barley see because we’d been told off for sitting outside the covered part of the boat – apparently the police would see – we arrived at our first stop the Thien Mu Pagoda.

The pretty seven tier brick stupa was built by Emperor Thieu Tri in the 1840s on the site of an ancient Cham temple. Each tier of the stupa is said to represent one of Buddha’s incarnations on earth.

Legend has it that in 1601 Lord Naguyen Hoang left Hanoi to govern the Southern territories. After arriving at the perfume river he met an old lady who told him to walk east along the river carrying a burning incense stick and to build his city where the incense stopped burning. Later Lord Hoang erected a pagoda in gratitude to the lady who he believed to be a messenger from the gods.

The Pagoda was pretty but there were people everywhere making it hard to get a good look at anything. Either side of the pagoda there was a pavilion on one side the pavilion housed a bell and the other housed a large stile erected in 1715 to record the history of Buddhism in Hue.

Behind the Pagoda was some pretty gardens a worship hall, a building under restoration and a number of monks cutting the grass. It was very pleasant walking around with the smell of freshly cut grass all around.

Passing through a gateway beside the pagoda a large group of people were gathered around an old Austin car. Getting closer I discovered this car once belonged to Thich Quang Duc. Thich Quang Duc became instantly famous after driving to Saigon, in the car that stood in front of me, parking up, sitting in the lotus position, dousing himself in petrol and setting himself alight. The act of self mutilation was in protest at the excesses of President Diem’s regime.

At the time of Thich Quang Duc self mutilation Thien Mu was already renowned as a centre of Buddhist opposition to colonialism. Today it continues to be know as a focus for Buddhist protest against repression and is a sore spot for the Vietnamese government.

After cursing further down the river our next stop of the day was Tu Duc’s mausoleum. We were dropped off a fair distance from the entrance and told to get bikes there. Luckily everyone on the boat was as stubborn as us and refused to pay the bike drivers choosing instead to walk the distance. The walk was very pleasant passing many street stalls where people were making incense and conical hats.

As we entered the 12 hectare walled garden housing the mausoleum to our left was a pretty lake covered with lotus leaves. This mausoleum only took three years to build allowing Tu Duc sixteen years livening in the beautiful surroundings before he died. Tu Duc was a romantic poet and the longest ruling of the Nguyen monarchs despite being known as a weak ruler who preferred to hide from the world among the gardens he created. He lived a life of luxury enjoying 80 course meals, had 104 wives and a whole village of concubines – though, possibly due to a bout of small pox, he didn’t have any children.

The first building we entered was the main temple, Hoa Khiem, which Tu Duc used as an office during his lifetime. Today this is the building where the funery tablets are housed. The building was nice but nowhere near as pretty as the gardens surrounding it.

From here we rushed to the Emperors tomb but only managed to catch the briefest glimpse before we’d gone 10 minutes over our allotted time and still had a 20 minute walk back to the boat!

We arrived back at the boat the find lunch laid out for us. We were surprised to find a lot more than rice and peas offered for free and we ate as we cruised leisurely down the river to our next stop.

The next stop was the mausoleum of Minh Mang. The mausoleum was pretty and we enjoyed walking around but by then I really was buildinged out and most of it passed me by in a haze of pretty rooms, furniture and gardens.

The guidebook offered this gem of information that I felt I should share:

Ming Mang fathered 142 children with his 33 wives and 107 concubines.

We got back to the boat and were taken to another mausoleum, this was too far from the river to walk so rather than taking a bike we decided to go for a beer with the two Aussie guys we’d been chatting to all day. This was the final stop of the tour and from here we cruised back to Hue watching people returning from a festival up river sailing past us still in party mode putting floating candles into the water and making offerings of paper money to the gods.

That evening we had another night bus journey this time to our final stop Hanoi. Thankfully this one was a lot more comfortable than the last!

* Posted by j150vsc on 09/09/2007.