Phong Nha and Hue

After leaving Hanoi I took an overnight bus to Phong Nha, about 10 hours south. Katie and I wanted to see Phong Nha National Park, another UNESCO World Heritage Site. It's known for it's massive caves. I'm mixing up the different caves there, but I think I visited the longest dry cave in Asia. The area also has a recently discovered cave, now believed to be the largest cave (by volume) in the world. You can't go into that one as a tourist, as it is still being explored. If you are a scientist though---or really rich--you can pay $3,000 to spend a few days inside the cave. I am neither of those things, so I stuck to the tourist parts.

After arriving to the small town of Son Trach which is located near the park, Katie and some new friends we met at the hostel headed out to explore. We did a small wooden boat ride to Phong Nha Cave, then road the boat further down through the first kilometer or so of the cave. We were also allowed to get out of the boat and walk around a bit. It was incredible--probably the most impressive cave i've been in yet. It was gorgeous. We spent that afternoon walking around San Trach, seeing the animals and local villagers going about their days. This area was also heavily bombed during the war, so we saw more bomb craters as well.

The next day we did a tour to the national park, including Paradise Cave, rode on part of the old Ho Chi Minh Trail, saw a temple where people come to make offererings to ancestors, and visited Dark Cave. Dark cave is exactly what it sounds like. We put on bathing suits and head torches, kayaked to the opening of the cave, then walked through mud and darkness. I'm talking mud up past my waist, scrambling and sliding down and through muddy pathways...super fun though! Then finally it ended in deeper water, where we could swim back out to the cave opening and kayak back to land. There was veggie soup--and rum shots--waiting for us when we returned. Our tourguide was an Australian guy who married a Vietnamese woman and has been living here for many years. He told us some incredible stories that he has heard about the war and we learned a lot about how this area was changed and impacted during that time.

The next morning we took the 5am (eesh) bus to Hue, another 4 hours south. Have I mentioned yet that I am making my way back down to Saigon, to reunite with Danit and head to Cambodia together on the 28th? If not, thats my plan. We spent a day in Hue, which is a city but much smaller than Hanoi and Saigon so it was a nice change of pace. Hue also has a huge Citadel in the old imperial part of the city so we explored that (and awkwardly/awesomely tagged onto an English-speaking tour so we could learn about the kings that used to live there and what the buildings were used for). I have not, but if you have seen the movie Full Metal Jacket, the citadel is where some of the scenes were shot. At this point I had a pretty bad cold and was feeling a bit run down, so we took it easy and chilled out that night. We were in a cute little hotel which ended up being cheaper than a hostel dorm, but with much more comfort. So we were happy.

We then moved on to Hoi An, which is were I am now. Next post will be about that!