Our next Vietnam destination was the city of Hue. To get to Hue, we had to endure a 15 hour 'sleeper bus' from Hanoi. We waited outside the bus for about 20 minutes while one of the bus guys said he couldn't let us on because he didn't have the keys and the driver was fixing the engine. Off course he didn't say this due to the fact he couldn't talk English and we don't talk Vietnamese but this is what we gathered from the hand gestures and that there was a man doing something with a wrench at the back of the bus. Good start. Finally when we was allowed on, we were told to take off our shoes and put them in plastic bags - then problem number one was quickly made apparent. The bus had a cockroach problem. They were reasonably small but just crawling the floors with a couple on the walls and on the chairs. The chairs were bunk beds in 3 rows with two walk ways either side. They half reclined and you could tuck your legs under the person in fronts. I jumped in the middle chair on the top bunk, I couldn't see any bugs in it so I figured it was safe. Silly to think such a thing really. It turns out that the middle seat only has half barriers on it and because the bus winds in and out of traffic so much you're constantly being thrown from side to side. Also my seatbelt was broken so I couldn't even strap myself in (Yes mum, next time I'll double check the seatbelt next time before I claim my seat). The next 15 hours were pretty horrendous, didn't hardly sleep, face planted the rank toilet wall, had a Vietnamese guy constantly spit phlegm into a plastic bag, someone sneakily smoking a cigar at the back of the bus, then to top it off, we had some guy try to sell us a trip to the DMZ war tunnels at 6 in the morning. All the while I'm trying to hold onto my chair handles so I don't fall out of yet another bunk.

9am, we arrived in Hue, pouring with rain, trying to get off the bus before the driver off loads our bags into the puddles. We couldn't check into the hostel until 11am so Christa, Nelen and I went in search for a little massage to try to click our backs. We paid £2 for a 15 minute massage that wasn't a massage! They put us in a room with 3 massage tables, and we each got prodded at, pushed into the chairs and had our hair flicked. While we were having it done we were giggling and laughing to each other about what the hell was going on. So so bizarre, we just left in this confused state and didn't feel very relaxed. Apparently that was a Vietnamese massage because Nelen went somewhere else later that day for a 'proper massage' but they did the same thing. Anyway once we had checked in our 14 bed dorm and looked at the map of Hue, we decided to visit a tomb then head to the local swimming pool for a swim/wash. We needed food first though so headed to a restaurant that was recommended by the hostel and trip adviser. My veggie noodles were good but Sebastian, now named Basty, wasn't impressed with his child sized pizza and Toms sickness from his malaria tablets was starting to kick in. We got in a taxi and went to the Khai Dinh Tomb, which is home to the remains of the 8th king in Vietnam. It felt like the 7of us were on a school trip. We bought our tickets, took our photos, walked around the tomb and watched the tv clips explaining the history of Hue's old town, temples and tombs. We arrived at the swimming pools and it wasn't what we thought it was, the pool was split into lanes rather then somewhere we could chill so we went back to the hostel. Tom really wasn't well at this point so he went to lay down and we wasn't far behind. We decided to have a chilled evening, little nap and a spot of dinner. Kate, Liv, Basty and I went to a little Italian-esque place. It was pouring with rain and freezing cold out. We opened the menu and straight away saw tomato soup, we knew it wouldn't be Heinz but it was amazing all the same, warmed us up straight away, followed by a pizza off course. The girls went to bed and so Basty and I went to meet Christa and Nelen in the bar next door, we had a few beers and then headed to bed too. Only to be woken up at 1am by two Dutch girls in the dorm, banging around, in and out of the bathroom, turning lights on and off. Finally they settled then a gay couple came in at 2.30am doing the same and waking us all up. Then later on an English guy comes in, relatively quiet but starts snoring within 5 minutes of him being asleep. Tom is on the bunk above him and starts rocking the bed to try to get him out of his deep sleep, didn't work so he tried to splash him with water, didn't work so he resulted in poking him with the corner of his pillow and told him. To top off the night of non-stop annoyances, two people in the room were leaving at 7am so their alarm was ringing out from 6am onwards. Now that is a bad night sleep in the hostel.

Woke up feeling groggy at 9.30am, we had the free hostel breakfast and checked out the room because we was heading to Hoi An today. There was a couple of hours to play with before our bus so we went to visit the Imperial City. It was 80,000 dong entrance fee, which is near £2.50, we accidentally walked in the exit and started walking down the tunnel. Suddenly security came running after us to order us to pay. It was like a comedy sketch, this little Vietnamese guy jumped round the corner waving his baton dressed in his blue security uniform chasing us. We all just burst into laughter, I felt rude afterwards but it was hard to contain ourselves. Liv and Tom managed to dodge the fee because they scurried round the corner and hid behind a tree. The town are currently reconstructing the Imperial city back to what it originally looked like so it's a bit of a building site. All the old structure mixed in with new bricks and building equipment left in random spots throughout the city, made it feel a bit odd. Plus there wasn't any information to what we was looking at so I didn't learn anything much. Back to the hostel we went, grabbed bags and got on our bus to Hoi An. This bus was so much nicer, no bugs, and us five girls had the back row of reclined chairs so it felt like a mini sleepover. An uneventful bus is a happy bus.