The Emperors' Tombs

Besides the imperial citadel, Hue still has other attractions, for instance, the tombs of the Nguyen Emperors which are scattered around Hue. I was somehow a bit too lazy to plan my excursion to the tombs, since it would be much fun doing all those alone, so I joined a local tour.

We boarded a dragon boat (some boat with its bowsprit replaced with a dragon's head) and sailed upstream on the Perfume River. Our first destination would be some local residence to visit the tropical garden (which of course was nothing extraordinary to me). The tour guide briefly introduced us various trees bearing tropical fruits; some foreigners gawked with disgust at the mention of "Durian". Weird.

Next we headed to thee Thien Mu Pagoda, which legends state that it was built by the emperor to reinforced his reign as the site of the pagoda bestows excellent feng-shui harmony promising thousand and thousand of years of imperial Vietnamese rule, and that proved to be wrong with the colonization of Vietnam by the French. Further upstream, we visited another small temple which shared the influence of the local Viet, Buddhist and Confucianism, and it was rather eerie and spooked the shit out of me.

Our dragon boat ended swiftly with the visit of the first tomb, and subsequently we visited the other tombs on a minibus. The tombs of the emperors were pretty much the same; there's an ornately decorated hall / shrine, which is guarded by stone carved statues of warriors, mandarins, horses, elephants, etc., and depending on each emperor's personal liking, the tombs are either beside (an) artificial lake(s), or at the foot/top of a hill. The emperors were clever enough to hide their coffins, so as to avoid grave robbers. I can't really remember which graves I had visited, but most of them were splendid, albeit the poor maintenance.

Finally we headed back to Hue, after stopping by to see a local incense-making store. The trip itself was fruitful, as I got to know Shirley, her mother and her friend. At least I did not have to talk to myself throughout the tour! We went out to our own ways after the trip, but it was delightful that we met each other again in Hoi An.