80 days

I've been on the road for exactly eighty days, and I've equalled Phileas Fogg and Michael Palin in regard to their famous travels, although I've only been a tiny fraction of the distance. I've often wondered what it would feel like to be away for so long. Well now I know. In some ways it feels like an age since I was at home, but in others I just can't believe it - a quarter of a year away from home already. Some of the stuff I did in Thailand seems yonks ago now, but being dropped off at Heathrow in June remains fresh in my memory.

Today has been spent exploring Hue by rented bright yellow bicycle. I've spent most of the day in the compound of the Forbidden Purple City, the residence of the Vietnamese monarchy from the early 1800s until the 1940s. A fascinating building even though much of it has been destroyed, and there is no longer a monarch to live in it. I tried to visit the main museum in Hue as well, but it turned out to be closed, so instead cycled around the town for a while and then headed back to my hotel. Unfortunately my bike fell apart on the way back (the peddles broke). Luckily a man with a hammer in a nearby restaurant was able to fix it enough for me to be able to cycle back, and leave pondering my insurance position for another day.

Before I did my sight seeing, I met a Vietnamese rice farmer, after he engaged me in conversation whilst we were both riding down a very busy Hue highway. He said he would like to show me around in exchange for the chance to practice his English, and no money would exchange hands. I was sceptical and thought it sounded like a scam, but cautiously agreed. We rode a circuit of the main city area, chatted about this and that, and then he dropped me off outside the entrance to the Forbidden Purple City. After we had pulled up he just thanked me and said have a nice day and then rode off. It really was no scam. He was just a nice man. So it does pay sometimes not to be too jaded about things and go with the flow. The most interesting thing he said, as I cycled and listened to him, trying not to get myself killed, was that his brother had died in their rice field last year after being bitten by a huge snake. Very scary to me, but it happens out here in the countryside, and is just a part of life.

I'm heading off at 6pm, Vietnamese time, to Hanoi, which will be my home for roughly the next week. The overnight bus takes a while so I won't arrive until 7.30am the next morning. Should be good and a little painful.