The Hue Citadel

Our journey to Hue started at 8am and ended at noon the next day. We had a short bus ride to the pier for a four hour boat ride back to the mainland where we hopped on our bus to Hanoi. Once back in Hanoi we boarded our sleeper train, which was fairly similar to the ones we traveled on in China. There were four berths to a room; however, the main different to Jenny’s excitement were the western toilets in each car as well as the informative signage.

Arriving in the afternoon we set out to visit the Citadel. Set on the northern bank of the perfume river this fortress was home to the emperors under the Nguyen Dynasty, beginning construction in 1805 and coming to completion 27 years later. The massive projected consisted of 140 complexes and protected in a 10km perimeter square wall. One could spend a whole day discovering the royal houses, halls, and gardens.

Despite all of the beautiful structures we later learn of the darker past the Citadel holds, as do many areas in Vietnam. January 31st, 1968 the Viet Cong were directed to remove the residing Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN) soldiers, civil servants, politicians, priests, and other foreign civilians, including Americans. The USMC, US Army and ARVN deployed units to recapture the city and in the following months mass graves containing thousands of the captured civilians and POW’s were found.