Danang/Hue/HoiAn 2025 - Hue Day Tour Breakfast at Hotel

Our first morning in Hue, what a lovely view to wake up to! Seeing the mountains and river of Vietnam, and their national flag waving proudly in the sky :)  Good morning Vietnam indeed! 

We got up rather early as we have a full day's tour arranged and they were going to pick us up around 8am. So we had to get ready and go for our breakfast before starting our tour. Still, I found time to admire the city view and watched it slowly wakes up from the morning mist that covers it.

Lovely to see the sun slowly rising and the colour of the sky slowly changing.

And the mountains. Like a Chinese painting. So very Vietnam vibe. Maybe cause my image of Vietnam is stuck in my last visit to Sapa with the rice fields and buffalo in the mist on the mountains. 

Every breakfast of ours is a buffet breakfast on this trip. This was only our 2nd one, so we were still going strong. Me, loading up on my passion fruit. I also tend to love eating porridge for my breakfast, especially when it comes with all sorts of condiments. 

Now, let me show you how many times of sticky rice, or rice starch related dishes available. After a while, they all looked the same to me, and tastes the same. The only different is probably the toppings, or fillings. The one above looks like koay teow with ham. They have those very luncheon meat looking ham. 

Above looks like rice cake with powdered shrimps, or maybe chicken floss?

These looks like those Hakka abacus dish. It's rice starch wrapped in some type of fillings. I want to say yam, but I think it's also shrimps, lol. 

Seriously, I gave up after a while. They all look the same! And I don't really fancy them much, so I didn't try all of them. You could eat them dripped in fish sauce, that helps a lot too.  Apparently, such rice starch dish is a signature dish of central Vietnam. That's why we see so many of them on the table. 

I tried to eat a little bit of everything, especially things that are new to me. And as I aged, I also tend to preference vegetables. I don't really like to load up on fruits so much, but I really appreciate cooked vegetables if available. Raw vegetables are a second choice for me. 

I also like to have some pastry, cause pastry cost more money to buy at home, and we don't often have crosissant for breakfast. I guess it's kinda like a luxury item. And in Vietnam, they sometimes do baguette and croissant really well! 

I don't know why there is a tray of sweet cakes served during breakfast, but it does brighten up the selection! I think I did try some of these, specifically the colourful ones at the top tier. They were mugbean filled cakes and not really that sweet.

After breakfast, we went to the lobby to wait for our tour guide to pick us up. We saw that there is also a Coffee Shop at the hotel, and many people were actually inside the shop. Unfortunately I did not get to try the coffee there through out our stay.  I think it would be quite a reasonable coffee since so many locals seems to get their coffee from there. 

Danang/Hue/HoiAn 2025 - Hue Night Walk and Bun Bo Hue Dinner

When we finally walked out and towards the more vibrant shopping streets of Hue where most of the tourist were, it started to feel more like Vietnam. I recalled how the buildings in Hanoi also looked like these ones above, very cute and narrow, and just a few storeys high.  

We also took a walk near the river side, and there seems to a park there with pavilion and other structures. As it was dark and wet, we didn't really spend much time exploring the area, heading instead to the brighter shopping streets further along the way.

They also have some floating restaurant along the river. I think I went into this one, and I think it was a Starbucks -_________-  But it does look magical from afar. 

Above is what it looked like as we approach it. Since we weren't interested in Starbucks, we just went in to look around and left. 

While exploring the streets area, we came across Madam Thu, and I told my friend that this was one of the place I had planned for us to dine at. It was a little bit expensive and more tourist friendly, but we decided to go in and give it a try. 

Some of the menu of the dishes offered. I only wanted to try the Bun Bo Hue, which translate to Hue's Beef Noodle. My friend also ordered the same. I also ordered coffee. My KPI in Vietnam is trying to drink one cup of coffee a day, cause Vietnamese coffee is super delicious!

The also have a sample set. Most of the traditional rice paper and sticky rice dishes were already available during our breakfast buffet in our Danang Hotel, so there was no need to order this at all. But I like it that they have tasting plater for tourist to try. I appreciate such menu when I'm in a foreign land and don't really know what to order, or when I really want to try everything but in a smaller portion. 

Our dinner in Hue. The Bun Bo Hue was just delicious! It was so comforting to eat it, so much so that I actually drank the soup dry lol, enjoying every drop of it. The coffee was also strong. The service was very tourist centric, and they do pester you to give a review for them after your meal. But for my first try trying this dish, and I also had it the next day, I would say Madam Thu's version was absolutely my preference!

Danang/Hue/HoiAn 2025 - Hue White Lotus Hotel

 

There was a lot of hype about a TV series called White Lotus, and I thought it would be kinda cool to tell people that I've stayed in the White Lotus before :D  Yes, I know cheesy. What would life be if we don't have some cheesy fun along the way? And yes, I did booked a hotel called White Lotus for our stay in the Imperial City of Hue. And it wasn't a bad hotel either!

We took a Grab there from Hue Train Station, and it was just a short ride away. It was quite dark and rainy when we reached the hotel, but the place was so beautifully decorated that I think we instantly fell in love with the place. Above is the lift lobby area. Maybe it's something about the IndoChime way of decoration that is just so soothing somehow. 

It was a blend of Buddhism and Zen, yet the decoration was modern and ancient all at once.

The hotel also provided spa services, but we didn't try any of it since we were only staying for two nights. I thought it was nice that the dedicated a table display area to display the items used for their traditional massage and spa. 

At the sitting area at the lobby, the decoration was rather bold, with bold patterns of white lotus in black and white, and modern plants decoration on the table. 

The design of some of the Buddhist item were really fascinating. I was quite tempted to get one of those hanging incense burner. They make it so artistic and well. I wonder if they are designed by the Vietnamese or are they made in China? 

The hotel was rather huge. Next to it was actually a convention centre also under the same establishment. We were located at the hotel side. There is even a coffee cafe inside the hotel. 

When we got to our room, we were really pleased. It was too expensive per night here, yet the room felt like a 5 star hotel with views to match. I love the decoration of white and green so much. To be frank, I wasn't expecting it to be this nice. 

Just outside the window was the city of Hue, and the Perfume River. And right across the river was the Hue Imperial Citadel City. On our ride to the hotel, even though a short ride, we were surprised that Hue looked nothing like that other more chaotic part of Vietnam. In fact, we both think that it looked rather European, with wide roads and large buildings that are built spaciously around the city. It didn't look anything like the Vietnam that I was used to. Everything seems calm and orderly here....

I tend to like to book hotel rooms with bath tub, so that I can soak in them with my bath salt. This was one of those hotel, and I'm happy to see the bath tub looks out directly to the city and river area. It was so relaxing to be able to enjoy a bath here. And the toilet was so beautiful and spacious too.

Even the bath amenities looked luxurious. I love the bright green tiles so much. Emerald green!

Speaking of bath salt, here was the collection I brought with me. Some I got from Tokyo Hand for like, 5 variety packs for 2.90sgd? And one of them was from the hotel I stayed at in Nagoya that provide bath salt for their guest. I love that hotel.

Just outside the bathroom, above is the wall that separates the room and the bathroom area. Doesn't it look lovely? Maybe a bit too colourful, but I just love those lotus pattern all over the place!

They also provide some coffee and tea drinking area. I think this was the place they gave Lotus Tea, and it was the first time I tried it. I like it so much I went and bought a box of it home with me and still enjoy it at home from time to time.

The view from our window. Does this even look like Vietnam to you? 

As the sun set, the lights came on, and you could see the reflections on the river. You could also see the bridges all decorated with multi colours of lights. 

They also provded some welcome snacks of peanut candy, and real flowers in the room! That's why I said, it gave a very 5star feel to the whole place! I enjoyed drinking my tea and having a snack at this table very much.

As it was drizzling outside, we decided to stay in a while and eat our kimbap for dinner? We eventually did went out to walk around and had a proper dinner outside. 

When they rain kinda stopped, we went out and walked towards the convention centre building to access the load that lead to the vibrant streets a few block away. More on that on the next post.

Danang/Hue/HoiAn 2025 - Hue Station

More views from our train window as the train slowly pulls into Hue area. 

 

I love the green paddy field view best. Here is one with a church and some trains passing by as we near Hue Station. There are actually a lot of churches in Vietnam, probably left over from when the French used to occupied this place.

Lots of low land river view. Flooding is a big issue in Vietnam because of the many rivers that run through the country. We will see more of this in Hoi An, and how high the water can actually go.

Green paddy fields. 

Finally our train came to a stop at Hue Station.  Ga, which means Chicken, also means Station! But the pronunciation is different. 

The Hue Train Station actually looked nicer than the one in Danang. It was starting to drizzle when we arrived in the evening, and we called a Grab to get us from the station to our hotel. I think Vietnam is the only country I would take Grab everywhere cause it's very convenient and affordable. I felt very spoilt in Vietnam. It's like a luxury travel destination for me because I can also splurge on nice hotel, massages and do some shopping and eat at nice restaurant. I think I will visit it more often in future as I slowly pick up more and more Vietnamese. 

Danang/Hue/HoiAn 2025 - Danang Train to Hue Midway LangCo Station Stop

 

The train actually make a 5 minutes stop or so in the middle of the journey, at a small town call LangCo Station. It was interesting cause you 're allowed to get off the train if you want. We of course didn't quite dare to in case we missed getting back on the train. But it was interesting to look out the window all the same.

There was another similar train at the opposite track from us, presumingly going in the opposite direction.

I was hoping that there weill be vendors coming up on the train selling us snacks like those in Hua Hin Thailand. But here, the vendors remain outside of the train. You could buy snacks from them by getting down the train, or via an open window. It was a lot less convenient than in Thailand where vendors just walked up and down the train offering a wide variety of different snacks for you to eat along your journey.

Some of the vendors sell their stuff from a motobike too.

Vendor selling things via the train station to a customer.

I would love to buy some, but I don't know how. And I think our windows don't open either.... WHY????

Some of the view we saw along the way....

Note that I had to edit a lot of these photos cause there were cable wire running along the track that made most of the photos pretty distracting to look at -____- """

Lots of water side view.

Some road side view too. You could also take the road to get between Danang and Hue. You could even get a motobike ride if you feel adventurous! The highway view was supposed to be fantastic.