Exploring Hue, Vietnam with 24mm Lens. Medieval, Colonial, Socialist Architecture, and Street Scenes

Sometimes, it feels like 50mm is a too small window; I want to open the door and go out to the balcony.

At such moments, I mount 24mm on my full-frame DSLR and enjoy the space. Sharing some wide-angle shots from Hue, Vietnam, showing how diverse the city is.

Starting the walk traditionally at the An Cuu River, as always, by An Dinh Palace (1919); you see its gates, renovated and derelict, a strange couple.

Beautiful Francis Savier Church in the city center. Love colonial Catholic churches.

Huế Province Cultural and Information Center with the slogan "Great President Ho Chi Minh Lives Forever in Our Cause!" (Google.Translate).

Brutalist architecture, right?

A poster promoting the heritage values. Looks like transformed socialist realism.

Something on the wall which Google.Translate can't understand.

Crossing the Perfume River towards the Citadel.

Le Loi Park, a view from the bridge. Hue is a most comfortable city which has no sea so crowds of expats, thank god, stay away from my 😄 city.

Dragon tour boat.

Walking towards the citadel and entering the first line of walls:

Boys fishing by one of the Citadel's bridges (Cầu cửa Thượng Tứ).

Kỳ Đài, an impressive platform with a giant flag and cannons.

They started to construct the citadel in 1687 to be the stronghold in Central and Southern Vietnam. In 1744, Hue was officially proclaimed the capital of Nguyen Vietnam (wiki).

Ngọ Môn gate of the Imperial city:

But most ancient things you can see in Hue were actually built in the 19th when the Nguyens united Vietnam and made Hue the national capital, and during French rule until WW2.

Tây Khuyết Đài gate of the Imperial city.

A young fisherman by the citadel.

External walls and picturesque moat at the sunset time.

"There is nothing more precious than independence and freedom", the slogan over the alley says.

"Hello, where are you from?", these kids didn't want to lose time and started talking to me as soon as they noticed me.

After asking their consent and taking a couple of pictures of them, I bowed to young ladies, like a Japanese (I always do this), and they, surprised by this, bowed back to me. Sure I made their day, lol. 😄

Cửa Hữu gate.

A random roadside store.

Piggy banks' stronghold.

Birds in cages.

A lovely walk it was, I enjoyed the wide-angle lens to to the full extent, and more wide-angle posts are coming in my blog. 🙂

More Southeast Asia adventures to come, stay tuned! Check out my previous posts on my personal Travelfeed or Worldmappin map.

I took these images with a Nikkor 24mm f/2.8D on a full-frame DSLR Nikon D750 in November 2024 in Hue, Vietnam.