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  • Day 82

    Abandoned Waterpark, Hue

    April 2, 2017 in Vietnam ⋅ ⛅ 20 °C

    Today was a free day so I took full advantage and lounged around in bed until about 11am when I finally decided to roll out of bed and find something to eat. I guess the rest of the group had the same idea because they were all eating next door when I showed up. We then decided that we'd spend the day by going to visit an abandoned Waterpark! That was super cool. We hired a group of locals to take us there in these "adult strollers" as we started calling them. I don't know the actual name, but we sat on a plush chair in front and they peddled from behind. The way was mostly flat but on the hills we got out and walked because, I at least, felt bad for them. But, for what we paid them I know they were super happy to do it! And on the way back we stopped at a local shop and had a beer with them so that was fun.

    Anyway, the Waterpark is abandoned because they ran out of money to finish building it, or so they say. There are different opinions on the matter. It seemed to be mostly finished but not completely, because no bathrooms were ever actually built and there were only some placed fitted with lights. There were a fair number of people there actually which kind of surprised me. I guess it's becoming more well known thanks to the internet. The first thing we saw was a giant dragon which we climbed up and into it's mouth for a full view of the park. The water park was actually more like a park than a water park like we know at home. The walk to the dragon was a lovely brick path through trees along a lake and things weren't packed together very closely, lots of vegetation. The most creepy part of the park was the bottom of the dragon where there was supposed to be an aquarium. The room was completely dark and there was shattered glass everywhere. Pretty cool! We wandered around the rest of the lake and found some waterslides which we definitely climbed up the wrong way and just had fun being without rules and restrictions. There was also an amphitheatre and some areas that had been prepped for development but never actually built on. Pretty neat area, too bad it didn't actually open.

    I think we spent about an hour and a half or two hours wandering around before heading back to the hotel. Once back at the hotel we went for a snack at the place we had breakfast, which is actually a bar called DMZ. We chatted with the manager for a bit and he told me that they'll be opening a sister bar in Vancouver this year or next! That will be cool. DMZ stands for De Militarized Zone and has to do with the war. Would be neat to see one open up in Vancouver. After a few drinks we met the group for dinner at a nearby Mexican restaurant before returning back to the bar. We were given free Buckets and sang some karaoke and just had a great time. I was playing pool with the manager and a fellow Canadian from Ottawa and when I looked back at our table the rest of the group had left... So I stayed out drinking with the two I was playing pool with. We went just around the corner and sat on the street next to a beer vending machine for a few hours lmao. We were approached by the Vietnamese Mafia at one point apparently, but they were friends with the guy we were with so no issues of course. Was quite an interesting experience, reminded me of home! My favourite kind of nights are the calmer, quieter ones. Good times for sure.
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