Hot Hue and Doing the DMZ

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After a 15 hour journey on the lovely sleeper bus from Hanoi - note the sarcasm these sleeper buses are not lovely, your feet lay in a enclosed box reminiscent of a coffin and if you are taller than 5 foot its rather uncomfortable, if you are a large chap /chapess you will discover that it is rather narrow, T opts for the centre aisle as the window seats offer a view but only the movement of one arm as the other is pressed against the window but for $15 you can’t complain too much! The bus is a coach and if you picture a coach similar to a greyhound or national express etc, and where the seats are rows of bunk beds two beds on the left window, two in the centre and finally two at the back with two floors of ‘love’ beds, these are four beds stuck together at the rear of the bus room for four people to get cosy.

We arrive into Hue (pronounced hway) this use to be the capital city back in the day and sports a large Citadel. Our home for the next two nights was the Sports Hotel where we had a massive room with two double beds (not quite sure why rooms have two double beds) a balcony and a normal price mini bar all for $22 US. To be honest Hue in T’s opinion is a stop off place, there isn’t anything encapsulating about the place but on the other hand there is nothing bad about it either.

After breakfast of ‘omelette eggs” and French bread we head out to explore the Citadel. The Citadel sits on the opposite side of the river to the main town, and languishes within 2 metre thick and 10 km long city walls and was built in 1804. Within the Citadel is the imperial enclosure with was reminiscent of a smaller, worn down version of Beijing’s Forbidden City without wow factor. It’s a pleasant place to visit and kill an hour or two but as the place is either falling down / in the process of being renovated there is little to see, add the searing heat to the mixture and it was suddenly beer o’clock and off we went in search of a cold amber drink!

We booked on to a day trip to the Demilitarised Zone (DMZ); we were torn between stopping up there on our own or to do the trip from Hue! The trip we went on cost $15 and kicked off at the ungodly hour of 06:30 IN THE MORNING and was scheduled to finish at 18:30 so a full 12 hour trip but it does cover an area of 400km. We went to see the Rockpile: this was a pile of rocks in the guise of a mountain which supported 300 US troops (not a 100% of the numbers so if wrong - what can you do!!) The position is located next to Highway 9 and provided a good vantage point of the area for the Americans when the mist was absent but was a nightmare when the jungle was misty, as the Viet Cong gorillas could attack the base at ease. This is featured in a number of Vietnam movies but we have had a memory block and can’t remember any - sorry.

We then visited the Khe Sanh Combat Base. The Khe Sanh Combat Base was a large US base close to the Laos Border. Next was the Dalcrong Bridge; this was the beginning of the all important Ho Chi Minh Trail, this was the trail the North Vietnamese army used to supply the Viet Cong gorillas in the south the trail ran from the Vinh Moc tunnels were they used boats to travel down south. It crossed the country nipping in and out of Loas and Cambodia before making its way towards Saigon, this was the ‘excuse’ the Americans used for bombing the shit out of Laos and Cambodia in illegal acts of war as these country were not engaged in the war. It is now a properly built suspension bridge and a tarmac highway.

Along the way we stopped off at a Minority Village, here their houses are on stilts to keep away from the scorpions and leeches at night. They are poor here and there were a lot of signs around suggesting that unicef work here especially by the school. The kids share their schooling with their siblings so when one is at home they can help their parents.

Finally, we went to the Vin Moc tunnel network, this was an extensive tunnel network which was the start or finish of the Ho Chi Minh trail and gorillas would leave the tunnels and head to the island before heading south. Entire villages lived in these tunnels, 7 children were born underneath the ground, it is an example of human ingenuity that these tunnels were created. The tunnels are a lot larger than the ones in Cu Chi measuring 1.9 metres high, the deepest tunnels were at 23 metres deep.

We drove through the Demilitarised Zone to get to the Vinh Moc tunnels, this zone was a creation of the USA, UK, China and USSR and was agreed at the Geneva accords in 1954 that Vietnam would be split at the 17th parallel north - for the geeks amongst you this is latitude line on globe that is 17 degrees north of the equator. Ben Hai river was the physical demarcation line and 5 km either side of the river would be a DMZ and the placing of military positions was forbidden in this area, the aim was to separate the Communist North from the Capitalist South in the same manner that occurred on the Korean peninsula. On the north side stood a massive wall of megaphones where propaganda was played to the south. During the American War the areas surrounding the DMZ were witness to some of the heaviest fighting.

Our guide was really good, a youngish chap with impeccable English skills, he was very informative - he also showed us where the ‘good’ prostitutes hang out, the man was obsessed, he also explained to a mixed audience the prices - for Vietnamese it costs 300,000 dong if you wanted it in a room or 250,000d not in a room, one would assume you had to watch more than your step if venturing off the beaten track around the bushes! For the Westerners he said would have to pay much more!!!!

This trip was brilliant but due to the distances involved and the amount of places to see a lot of the day was spent in the minivan driving around. We heard people moaning about the amount of time spent driving, which we found unbelievable! If you want to see all the sights you have drive long distances it’s that simple, if you want to see all the sights without spending long periods in the car either stay up in the DMZ area and take your time or bring your own helicopter and fly round!

After a brilliant day we arrive back at Hue and head to the bar for a cold one!!!

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