What happens in Viet Nam when an anti-war activist - a person who considered her arrest during the march on Washington in 1968 a badge of honor - arrives as a tourist thirty years later?

Saigon, Hue, Hanoi – hardly ideal vacation spots 30 years ago unless one was fond of the smell of napalm in the morning. Today, a visit to this ancient and elegant land is an exotic adventure. And for me it was a personal reconciliation a stark black granite wall didn't provide. Thirty years is a long time for a naked child, burned and terrified, to run behind your eyes.

Double Dragon Boat in Saigon River

Somewhere between the busy Saigon river, where exquisite "double dragon" boats share the waters with commercial shipping and the occasional cruise liner, and the ethereal beauty of Ha Long Bay, I lost that image. At last. Maybe it was the Jade Emperor's doing.

Cruise tourism in Viet Nam, once ashore, is well-organized and regimented. There are official buses, official guides, official comfort and shopping stops. The high comfort factor is overbalanced by frustration if the tourist is me – a child of the '60s when rebellion was in fashion, fearless explorer if I have my guidebook in one hand and my husband's hand in the other.

We had two unofficial missions in Saigon, drinks on the Rooftop Garden of the Rex Hotel where officers, gentlemen, and State Department types took refreshment, and meeting the Jade Emperor – the Taoist equivalent of St. Peter – in his pagoda.

Atop the Rex Hotel

Joined by four new friends, we were six – the few, the brave, the bold –the freelancers – ashore and heading for the Rex. With a guidebook in my hand and more than a little uncertainty in my heart, I was in the country my generation was asked to die for.

The battle was joined at the first major intersection where swarms of bicycle cavalry riding off in all directions stopped our advance, cold. Saigon does have traffic lights, operational ones are a rare sight. We were rescued by friendlies in the form of pedi-cab drivers who, for $1 each, promised to pedal us off to our destination. It didn't occur to me that our drivers wouldn't stick together.

They didn't. I was completely alone, separated from my companions, in a city that is not tourist-oriented. Maybe it was the warm evening touched with harbor-smell. Maybe it was the sense of being carried along on a river of a million colors as women in traditional ao dais sped by. Maybe it was the gentle hiss of the bike tires on the street. It might even have been Jade Emperor – I felt no fear.

Rooftop sign on the Rex Hotel

Reunited at our vantage point atop the hotel, drinks in hands, our little squadron peered over the wall and marveled at the busy-ness of downtown Saigon. First mission accomplished.

Next day, following an official visit to the Cu Chi tunnels, the communication, transportation and lodging network for the Viet Cong, it was time to meet Jade Emperor. The official guide on the official bus was not in favor of our plan. We threatened mutiny. He stood firm. Money changed hands. He instructed the driver to stop and told us he would deal with the taxi driver. Armed only with directions to the pagoda and back to the ship – written on the back of last night's bar tab by our grudging guide– we were free. A cab drew up. We sped away, leaving the guide to continue the official tour.

Next stop, Da Nang, the port for Hue. The spouse, fully armed with optical weapons, boarded the official bus for the official eight-hour tour to Hue, through the legendary Cloudy Pass

The road up Cloudy Pass

Andy's note: The trip over Cloudy Pass is a true test of one's intestinal fortitude. The narrow road switches its way up and down the mountain with little in the way of protection from the steep slope on the down side. Little pagodas dot the hillside as a testament to the many who did not complete the trip.

Afterward, I was sorry to have missed the opulent architecture of the old Imperial Capital, but I was more than satisfied with my own search-and-destroy mission on the pagodas and merchants of the peaceful ancient city of Hoi An. Inland, on the other side of the Marble Mountains from Da Nang, Hoi An is a smallish city, little more than a town, where the war did not intrude. Narrow houses, homes to generation after generation, line narrow streets. Just as we find America in small towns, I found Viet Nam in Hoi An.

With a pagoda or assembly hall at almost every turn, my sortie partner, Kevin, and I quickly reached overload, broke ranks, and turned our attention to shopping, much to the distress of the official tour guide who couldn't decide between chasing us down or herding the rest of the group into yet another pagoda. She finally ran us to ground – or river – on a floating restaurant which featured ice-cold beer. China Beach near Da Nang The spoils of our shopping raid stowed, we were ready for a landing at China Beach. We landed, sat in the sand, and stared at the eternal ocean.

Ho Chi Minh's memorial and tomb One more official tour bus, one more official tour. This time, from Haiphong Harbor to Hanoi, home of The Frozen Ho Chi Minh and the infamous Hanoi Hilton – the official lodging for captured U.S. servicemen. Our advance intelligence (don't tarry at the official rest stop) and a bus driver whose idol must have been Mario Andretti got us to the mausoleum – which looks like nothing more than a cheap knock-off of the Lincoln Memorial with seconds to spare. We decorated our official tour guide with tomb-forbidden items – cameras, purses and hats – and assumed the required prayerful attitude as we entered the building. It was a stark, chilling moment when I looked at the face of my old enemy. The refrigerated air slipped past my skin and into my heart.

Ho Chi Minh's Hanoi residence Mercifully, the moment was soon over, and the edges of the experience were softened by the lush gardens we walked through on our way to Ho's former home. This oasis of spare grace and calm water, surrounded by elegant French Colonial office buildings, showed a side of the foe I would never have imagined.

Inside the Temple of Literature A retreat to the 11th Century was next on the agenda. Ancient history –welcome refuge and solace after too many harsh reminders of contemporary history. Inside the walled gardens of the Temple of Literature, traffic sounds fade. Massive stone tablets, centuries old, mounted on the backs of equally old and massive stone tortoises, bear the names of ancient scholars. Scholar synergy. We were set upon by a band of college students, taking advantage of a glorious day to picnic among the ancients. Their leader, tinier than our own diminutive daughter, shyly offered to share their lunches with us in exchange for English practice. Shared food, shared conversation, even with linguistically awkward moments, it was the most satisfying meal of my life. We didn't have to make peace. We had it. The sun on my back and in their faces melted the last of Ho Chi Minh's chill.

After reconnoitering with the official tour, members of which were eating the official lunch, we pled a need for more film and hit the streets to walk and absorb the flavor of the city whose name was, for so long, anathema. If exuberant Saigon is a face-splitting grin, most of Hanoi – with the exception of the vibrant and vigorous marketplace in the Old Quarter – is a blank stare.

On that early last morning at sea, suitcases packed and ready to go against our arrival in Hong Kong, I escaped the breakfast crowd and stood alone in the eerie, thick quiet on deck. The pearls were ghostly, shrouded in mist. I raised my coffee cup to Jade Emperor and gave him permanent custody of the emotional baggage I'd been carrying for so long.