Rain in Hue/ DMZ tour

Asia » Vietnam » North Central Coast » Thua Thien - Huế » Hué
December 18th 2005

Published: December 28th 2005

Edit Blog Post

cliffyboy

On the tandem

What a lovely looking pair!

It was pelting it down when reached Hue in the early morning. We hopedthe rain would stop shortly as we set off and visited the Citadel and forbidden palace that used to house the emperor of this ancient capital of vietnam. Unfortunately this structure had been damaged during the war with the french and you really had to use your imagination to grasp it's former beauty. In the terrible weather this was slightly beyond me but i was charmed by the Emperors Reading Room. Tourists can pose in costume as the emperor on thrones, not my cup of tea but they enjoyed it. Sightseeing was then abandoned for the day due to the torrential rain.

The next day we went on a DMZ ( Demilitarised zone) tour that took us to Vinh Moc tunnels, the DMZ line that divided north and south vietnam, and the site of the US Ke Sanh base near the Laos Border. Our long haired, leather clad guide, who looked like a vietnamese Jim Morrison explained the context of the war in a dispassionate manner. He told us that the US had came to "protect the south from the communists, they did not do a good

Bridge on DMZ

job." In doing so the US had bombed villages and cities, dropped millions of tons of toxins to destroy forests in order to remove cover for the North Vietnamese and VIet Cong troups. These toxins also had serious side effects on the people exposed to it, and has caused children to be born with serious birth defects to this day.

THe Vinh Moc tunnels where built to house villagers who lived near the DMZ that where regularly bombed. All human life was forced to be moved underground, including schools. Seventeen babies where born in these caves during the war. One cave nearby was bombed by the US and collapsed killing 100 people. The horror of war.

THe US was forced to abandon Ke Sanh military base after it came under constant attack from the Viet Cong. Here you can see a small musuem, a tank, a bunker, and a few US helicopters. The museum displayed a side of the war i had not seen before, vietnames women on the front line, tribal people helping transport weapons.
The base was next to a coffee plantation and children waved as we drove past on our way home- i felt melancholy