Explore the magnificent ancient civilisations of Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos, accompanied by Dr Peter D. Sharrock and the SOAS Alphawood alumni who are now restoring temples, curating museum collections and writing joint museum catalogues with us.
The journey begins in Hanoi, one of Asia’s most beautiful capitals. Visit the ancient quarter with narrow streets of merchants’ stall and sidewalk cafes and drive to the eleventh century Temple of Literature, a Confucian centre of Mandarin learning established early after the country’s independence from Chinese rule. Visit the National Museum with archaeologist Dr Le Thi Lien, the Ho Chi Minh Museum, the pagoda built on a single pillar and the Imperial Citadel. Fly to Hué, the graceful old imperial capital, where the 19th century Nguyen Dynasty citadel, modelled on Beijing’s Forbidden City, is restored as a UNESCO Word Heritage site with a museum of the Dynasty’s treasures. Visit the tombs of the Nguyen dynasty emperors gracing lovely pine forests along the Perfume River. From Hué, drive along the spectacular coastline to Da Nang and visit to the Museum of Cham Sculpture with alumna Nguyen Duyen, an important contributor to the stunning catalogue Vibrancy in Stone: Masterpieces of the Cham Museum of Sculpture written by Museum staff and SOAS.
Spend a night at the charming riverine port of Hoi An, which was originally settled by Cham navigators thousands of years ago. With leading Cham art historian Nguyen Ky Phuong, drive up to the My Son complex of ancient Cham brick temples beautifully set in a circle of mountains and sacred mostly to Shaivism but also to tantric Buddhism.
Fly south to Ho Chi Minh City, formerly Saigon, the bustling commercial capital of the south, squeezed on to a strip of delta-land in the estuary of the Mekong River. (Stay in Continental Hotel?) Visit the History-Museum, Ho Chi Minh City with Director Dr Hoang Anh Tuan, curator Uyen Pham and alumna Dr Nguyen Thi Tu Anh.
Fly to Phnom Penh, the capital of Cambodia, now growing prosperous after the devastation of the Khmers Rouges. Visit the Royal Palace and Silver Pagoda on the waterfront at the junction of the Mekong and Tonle Sap Rivers. Walk to the National Museum to be guided around the greatest masterpieces of Khmer art by alumna Khun Sathal, now Deputy Director. The elegant around the greatest masterpieces of Khmer art, including recently repatriated statues and jewelry from US museums. Drive towards Siem Reap and Angkor, stopping en route at Kompong Thom museum and the nearby large 7th century pre-Angkorian temple city of Sambor Prei Kuk. Proceed to the Siem Reap hotel and have dinner at the open-air Old French Market. At its apogee in the 12th century, the Khmer Empire stretched from Central Vietnam to the Burmese border and down to the Thai Peninsula. The capital Angkor rivalled the Chinese capital with a population of almost a million, while some 20,000 Parisians lived around Notre-Dame. The Empire’s kings and craftsmen built temple complexes that count among the most sophisticated and impressive in world history. Many of them are on our itinerary.
Fly from Siem Reap to Luang Prabang, the 14th century capital of neighbouring Laos and the celebrated Shangri-la of the whole region. A walking tour of the beautifully painted wooden temples culminates in a visit to the Palace Museum and a boat trip on the Mekong to the Cave of a Thousand Buddhas.
The journey has been planned for the Alumni of SOAS University of London and is also open to family and friends of Alumni. Please note that Distant Horizons has sole responsibility for the operation of this tour. SAOs, the participating University has no direct control over the operation the tour.
Trip Leader: Professor Peter Sharrock
Dr Sharrock is the SOAS-Alphawood Group Director of Regional Partners, Summer Programmes and Alumni Support in the university, which is redefining the young states of Southeast Asia as the leading innovators in temple building (Angkor Wat, Bayon, Borobudur, Bagan) and 'state protection Buddhism' at the turn of the first millennium, when Buddhism faced extinction in India and China. He has travelled widely in Southeast Asia and has accompanied several journeys for Distant Horizons.