Hoa Lu

Roughly about 110 km from the city of Hanoi, along a fairly large and busy road (just over two and a half hours if you're lucky), there's the town of Hoa Lu. The route is quite pleasant and the scenery is very varied, from rice paddies, oxen plowing, very different water wheels from those in Spain, and flowers. There was an extensive "blanket" of flowers along the road, predominantly chrysanthemums of different colours. We finally got to Hoa Lu, and although we expected more temples, pagodas, and palaces, we were surprised at how interesting it was. Its landscape is a real treasure that makes us understand why this site was chosen years ago as the capital of Vietnam.

The historic Hoa Lu can be found 12 kilometers northeast of Ninh Binh. It' supposed to be a very important place for the Vietnamese. It became the imperial capital in the 10th century. At present there are only a few vestiges of the royal splendor left. The palace and the citadel are in ruins, and the Tien Hoang and Le Dai Hanh temples are barely still standing. Besides these two temples, there's a hill nearby that's very difficult to climb to get to the tombs. I almost suffocated during the ascent on those steep steps, but the panoramic views of the area are worth it. At the top there was only