Wednesday 8th November

At last time to leave Hue, and not a moment too soon. After seeing no rain for weeks (though there had been some overnight here) we saw enough of it all morning to turn the road outside the hotel into a river knee deep in places. Though our area was worse off than most, down a nearby street the water was lapping up people's thighs. The buildings were mostly safe from the flooding though the water lapped their top steps but getting around involved hopping from porch to porch where possible or getting wet from the flood and stair-rods of rain.

Tracy took the sensible approach of going off on a cyclo for a massage, well surrounded by a cover and tarp. Tim had to do the wading to finalize some travel arrangements, and of course to get a picture!

Tim with Cyclo right outside our hotel

We didn't really get much else accomplished in the day other than watching the rain and getting in another curry. Our taxi to the airport made it through the ebbing flood in the afternoon and we had an eventless flight to Ho Chi Minh City (HCM) where a quick cab ride brought us to the very pleasant Empress Hotel. These days the airport is pretty quiet, though there is a big new terminal going up so they must be looking for expansion. However in 1968 it was the third busiest airport in the world... for obvious reasons. There are still concrete buildings and old planes that date from those days off to the sides of the runways.