The Rest of the Time in Vietnam
After our Halong Bay trip we hung out in Hanoi for a day with Olga and Duffy wandering around the neat little streets and alleys of the old quarter and seeing some of the sights.
Then it was off to Ho Chi Minh City. HCMC was much more touristy then Hanoi and the tours we did we not nearly as good or as exciting but a couple of things were interesting. The first day there we did a day trip out to the Mekong Delta. Overall the trip was not worth doing but was an ok way to spend a day and allowed us to buy some coconut candy straight from the pot! On the second day we did a half day trip out to the Cu Chi tunnels, which were very neat to see. I can't believe that people could fit in some of them and even lived in them. And then that afternoon we flew out to Cambodia, so just a quick hop in to HCMC, next time we will have to spend a bit more time there and get off the usual routs to really see the area.
posted by Doug and Sarah @ 6:44 PM
2 Comments:
Can you explain about the tunnels? I don't get it.
Looks like a great trip! Loved the bit about Doug's softie Dad- has he ever been to Mexico?
The history lesson (abreviated version)...
The North Vietnamese used the tunnel network to gain ground (ha ha) into South Vietnam. Overall there is more then 200km of tunnels under Vietnam that are in some places 3 tunnels deep. The people would live in the tunnels, use them for supply chains and would attack from them, popping up and catching the Americans by surprise. The Americans couldn't fit in the tiny tunnels (and if they did manage to enter there were booby traps waiting for them) and tried unsuccessfully to gas/flood them out, so it was the tunnels that helped the North win the war.
Post a Comment
<< Home