Caving in Vietnam

Our visit to the UNESCO World Heritage Phong Nha-Ke Bang National Park was one of the highlights of our time in Vietnam. The area is famous for its dramatic karst scenery of extensive cave systems (including the world’s largest) and rugged mountainous peaks. Our journey there began with a gruelling four hour local bus journey from the historical city of Hue. We were packed like sardines, two to a seat, with some perched awkwardly on plastic stools in the aisle. The bus had air con, but the driver opted for natural ventilation instead; fine if you had a window seat, not so great if you are sandwiched between four Vietnamese, as I was. The typical Asian cargo load of mystery packages, squawking chickens and a motorbike were offloaded seemingly at random on rambling detours. The bus was equipped with a novelty horn, which the driver used enthusiastically and unnecessarily throughout the journey, much to our annoyance. Several passengers attempted to sit in the unoccupied front seat, but it soon became clear that this was exclusively reserved for Vietnamese babes, for whom we digressed further from our route to pick up and drop off along the way. After arriving, and once we’d restored the blood flow to our lower extremities, we walked a short distance to another pepper farm home stay, from where we explored the park the next day.

Son Doong Cave, discovered in 2009, is officially the world’s largest. It is apparently so big that an entire Manhattan street block, skyscrapers and all, could comfortably sit within it. The cave’s vast size and inaccessibility mean that access involves a $3000, five day expedition, so we settled for the more tourist-friendly options. Our first visit was to Paradise Cave, another fairly recent discovery, which is a staggering 31km long. Access required a walk through the jungle and 500+ sweaty steps up to the modestly sized entrance. As we approached we were greeted, to our delight, by a huge draught of cool air. It was like entering an enormous walk–in fridge – just what we needed after our sweltering climb. We descended down some steps into the cathedral-like atrium. Echoed voices and the reverberating drips of mineral rich water, together with the dim lighting, contributed to the mystical atmosphere. The cave impressed not only in scale but also in the peculiar formation of its immense stalagmites and stalactites.

The high point of the day had to be the adventurous and surreal experience we had at the ominously named Dark Cave. Upon arrival we were fitted with life jackets, head torches and hard hats before kayaking to the cave-mouth and entering, bare foot, over sand. Unlike Paradise Cave there was no artificial light and so we were quickly reliant on our torches to guide us. We were led through a labyrinth of narrowing passages, the cave walls gradually turning from hard rock to slippery wet clay. The tunnel became more challenging and we were soon clambering over what felt like lumps of soft butter, which squelched through our toes with each step. It was a constant battle for grip. At one point we had to climb up a steep slippery slope and many surrendered inevitably to painful-looking falls. Fortunately the soft clay surroundings were akin to a padded cell, making serious injury virtually impossible. After regaining our footing we reached the end of the trail, where we slid downwards into a huge mud bath. We sunk deep into the cool, oozing clay and switched off our torches. It was one of those rare occasions when you get to appreciate the unreal sensation of complete darkness. The playful European boys in our group spotted the opportunity to use the shield of darkness for some mischievous poking and groping of their bikini-clad friends. This progressed into a full on mud slinging fight, in which we caked each other from head to toe. It was like a kids party when someone shouts “FOOD FIGHT!” A swim in the cool cave river provided a welcome opportunity for some  mud scrubbing. I made a particularly poor effort of cleaning my face, much to everyone’s amusement as we exited the cave.

Our day ended with an hour or so of driving through the beautiful surroundings of the park. The spectacular karst formations against the evening sky made for a breathtaking landscape. The distant humps appearing as through they’d once spontaneously erupted from the earth below. We left the park excited that the same cave systems would bring us further adventures across the border in Laos.

Amazing landscape

Pepperhouse Homestay

Sheer karst

Stalagmite

Cathedral-like cave

A cool river we swam in

Jungle

Driving

Scenic road

Vietnamese Island Homestay

After crossing the Cambodian-Vietnamese border overland we travelled back on ourselves by boat to the island of Phu Quoc. The ownership of this archipelago, which we could see from Kampot, has long been contested by the two nations. Phu Quoc is bigger and more developed than Koh Rong, where we stayed in Cambodia, but once again we had an atypical experience as we stayed in the island’s undeveloped interior. We chose to do a homestay with a lady named Jenny and her family, providing an authentic introduction to Vietnam. The family’s main business was running a pepper farm, where we stayed in amongst the rows of tall conical plants.

Jenny had two incredibly cute children, three-year-old Tiger and seven-year-old An, who had an insatiable appetite for games. Upon our arrival An gave us a tour of the family’s farm and impressed us with her English when she pointed out pineapples, limes and lemongrass that were growing on the family’s land. It was interesting to see how these familiar ingredients actually grow. Our tour had barely finished before An covered both big brown eyes with her small hands and propositioned us with the words, “one, two, three?”, expectantly. We understood the universal language of Hide and Seek and Laurence began to count while I hid with Tiger and An. Tiger held my hand and tugged me down until I was crouching at his level. Each time we hid, he put a finger up to his mouth and ordered me to “shhhh”, excitably, whether I was making a noise or not. To him, it was an essential part of the game. We’d “hide” in the most visible places while Laurence pretended he couldn’t see us. When finally “found” Tiger giggled uncontrollably at the thrill before pointing at me or An, indicating it was our turn to count (it was never his). We played for what felt like hours. Laurence and I grew sweaty and our legs were beginning to ache from constantly crouching to please Tiger, but his and An’s enthusiasm never ceased. The announcement of dinner was our only saviour.

After mixed food in Cambodia, we were looking forward to the Vietnamese cuisine and were not disappointed as we were force-fed crab after crab, vast quantities of barbecued squid, and small deep-fried fish. All were served with plenty of rice, an amazing variety of fragrant herbs, and Jenny’s delicious homemade pepper and lime dip. Jenny’s husband demonstrated their custom of wrapping all of the ingredients in rice paper before dipping the parcel in the zingy sauce. As we chatted about the cultural differences between our countries, we were plied with sickly sweet homemade myrtle wine – so sweet that their children seemed to have developed a taste for it as well.

The pepper farm was remote and so our only way to explore was on the family’s brand new motorbike. It was quite a responsibility but Laurence soon got the hang of the island’s bumpy dirt tracks. We spent a day visiting the more remote beaches of the north, stopping to cool off in the sea and for refreshment breaks. It was here we had our first taste of the famous Vietnamese coffee. Although Laurence in particular was sceptical, the intense bitterness of the Robusta coffee made an altogether different drink when iced and accompanied with condensed milk. In fact,  he was not too sad to ditch his single origin Arabica in place of the ubiquitous and cheap iced coffee, which hence became part of our daily routine. The beaches were empty but their beauty was scarred by massive concrete construction sites as they begin to develop. When we mentioned this at dinner, Jenny lamented the privatisation of beaches for resorts like these and wondered whether, by the time Tiger had grown up, there’d be any public beach left for him and his friends to enjoy. As a tourist, the prospect of a private beach is always enticing so it was good to be reminded of the flip side of such a luxury.

The next day, Jenny took us snorkelling with Tiger while An was at school. This was homestay-style snorkelling. We arrived at the spot where a local fisherman had agreed to pick us up and take us out in his boat, only to find out that all the fisherman were drunk on rice wine (at 10 o’clock in morning!) We followed Jenny round the village as she asked acquaintances if anyone could step in. Luckily, a friend offered up their daughter who could row us to the coral. We were welcomed, stooping, into their rickety wooden house, which lay on stilts across the water. The girl waded out back to bring the boat in, while we sat in a hammock watching the lapping water through gaping cracks in the floorboards. Her mother was keen to protect my much envied white skin so gave me a traditional Vietnamese hat for the day. We were surprised to see how widely used they were in Vietnam, having assumed nowadays they’d just be worn for show. In the intense sun I understood how impossible a day’s work out in the rice paddies would be without one. It was like having a tree with me all day!

We set off at a snail’s pace in the ancient rocky boat, with improvised fishing-net oar hooks. When finally we reached the coral, Jenny invited us to jump in – harder than it sounds when the water is shallow and the boat is barely seaworthy. As Laurence braved the manoeuvre, Jenny shouted “mind the sea urchins!” a little too late… He got painfully spiked by five spines in one foot. We later saw Jenny instructing Tiger to wee all over her spiked foot but Laurence didn’t much fancy the alternative Vietnamese treatment! The snorkelling was ok but I think the mention of coral had conjured tropical images of brightly coloured angel and clown fish, stingrays and turtles in our minds. Unfortunately all were absent, as was the concept of responsible snorkelling. Rather than not touching the coral, we had to jump out the boat directly onto it, and instead of simply observing and taking nothing from the site, Jenny hacked sea urchins off the rocks and caught tropical fish! This highlighted the lack of education the locals have towards the fragile nature of the reefs here and, while we really enjoyed our day, we were left with a slightly guilty feeling that trips like ours were partly responsible for the lack of marine life we witnessed.

Foodies as we are, the most memorable experience was lunch. We had a barbecue on the beach of freshly caught squid and fish. Eating the unprepared squid was a messy operation, the ink blackening our hands and faces to the amusement of our Vietnamese hosts, who managed effortlessly. Then, Jenny and the skipper donned our snorkelling masks and caught some sea urchins for us to try. Any guilt we may have felt was eradicated by the pain in Laurence’s foot and we ate a stack of around fifteen with Jenny’s chilli-lime sauce to exact revenge! They were sweet and succulent with a hint of salt from the brine but also rich and creamy with a luxuriant texture, similar to that of scallop roe. Freshly plucked from the sea, it was a special way to experience a new food, especially being able to indulge in a limitless supply. I dread to think what fifteen of them would cost in the UK!

 

From Kampot to Kep

Kampot

Sad to leave the beaches of Sihanoukville and Koh Rong behind, but eager to press on towards Vietnam, Kampot and Kep were our final destinations in Cambodia. Nothing could compare to the paradise we’d left behind, but both towns had charm.  In Kampot we spent our time cycling around enjoying the town’s cafes or lounging by the riverside, with frequent dips for some respite from the searing heat. It was the hottest time of the year in Cambodia, and the lack of air con in our $5 room took its toll. We soon understood why the French set up a hill station in the nearby mountains.

Bokor National Park is Kampot’s main attraction, with its cooler temperatures, spectacular views over the Vietnamese island of Phu Quoc, and crumbling colonial buildings. The summit is over 1000 metres, so our only options for climbing the mountain were by tour bus or hiring our own wheels. Neither of us wanted the inflexibility and tackiness of an organised tour so we reached the inevitable dilemma that all backpackers in Asia must face: whether to hire a motorbike without any prior experience. After some umming and ahhing and YouTube instructional videos of how to ride an automatic scooter (Yeah, I realise now it’s not that complicated) we took the plunge.

Luckily I was a natural and before long we were flying around the mountain’s hairpin bends like Valentino (and Valentina?) Rossi, defying gravity by leaning at impossibly acute angles and clipping apexes perilously close to shear drops. That’s at least how it felt, and with a broken speedometer, we could have been going that fast…though the steady stream of overtaking vehicles perhaps suggested otherwise. The views were spectacular and the road must have been Cambodia’s best, making the drive the highlight of the day. At the summit Clare admitted that she felt safer on the back of my motorbike than when in the passenger seat of my car… probably a fair point.

There were supposedly some interesting sites scattered across the top of the mountain including a waterfall, a colonial era Catholic church, and an eerie sounding abandoned French casino. It being the end of the dry season the waterfall was almost waterless, I reckoned the primitive shower at our hostel provided a greater flow of water. Iguazu falls it certainly was not, however in the absence of gushing water, it was interesting to see the dramatically carved naked rock.

The old French casino was the most baffling site. We’d heard about it and thought that the colonial ruins sounded cool. However, due to structural issues, the Cambodians had questionably decided to cover the whole building in plaster, disguising much of its period charm, and making it superficially unimpressive. Once inside, however, the grandeur of the original games room with its high ceilings and tiled floors harked back to a bygone era.

Kep

A short bus ride from Kampot was the small coastal town of Kep, where we found ourselves relaxing in a sea view bungalow complete with pool…or not. Instead of spending our final days in Cambodia catching some rays, I made the questionable decision of taking us on an 8km hike through another national park. The heat was unrelenting and the inclines steep – I soon began to look like Rick Stein, wok-side, as the sweat patches on my linen shirt merged together like tributaries of the Mekong river. An icy lime juice cooled and quenched, while a banana, peanut and chocolate pancake was well-earned elevenses.

It had in fact been our appetite for good and interesting food that had brought us to Kep in the first place. The town’s main draw is its famous crab market, where several restaurants on stilts serve it just-caught with fresh green Kampot peppercorns. The milder heat and zing of the fresh pepper provided a great accompaniment to the sweet, succulent crab meat and we shamelessly sucked and chewed at every last leg and claw. Kampot province was once world-famous for the quality of its pepper and they say it used to be on every table in Paris. We ate to the backdrop of an incredibly colourful sunset and, as a storm set in, a power cut and the sound and spray of crashing waves made for an atmospheric evening. Still, we left Cambodia feeling like there was a lot more to see, and it was added to our now ridiculously long future holiday list.

View from the summit of Bokor National Park, Kampot

Waterless waterfall

Catholic church at Bokor National Park

The dilapidated interior of the Catholic church

Plastered remains of the old French casino

Kampot’s famous durian monument

Our bungalow in Kep

Kep National Park

Another generic Asian lager

Sea view at the crab market

Crab with green pepper

Lonely Beach

After a four hour boat ride through rough seas, complete with a sea-tornado and vomiting Australian, the aptly named Lonely Beach came into view. Seen from the now calm waters, the sweeping bay, fringed with palm trees, appeared uninhabited. With the afternoon sun falling on the golden sand the beach resembled a true postcard paradise. As we drew closer, a couple of simple wooden structures could be seen through the jungle, which was where we would be staying – a stark contrast to the opposite, developed side of the island with its party atmosphere. This was definitely back to basics, but in a really good way. Our accommodation was an open air dorm with only a mosquito net between us and the island’s wildlife. Each night we climbed inside our cocoons and were lulled to sleep by the jungle’s soothing song.

Our stay gave us an insight into the realities of island living. With the main pier at Koh Rong’s opposite side and no roads, Lonely Beach is completely cut off and accessible only by private boat. The island has electricity for a few hours a day, making amenities we take for granted, like refrigeration, tricky. Huge blocks of ice had to be imported by boat, big enough to keep goods cool until more was brought over the next day. Most food came from the mainland’s markets too. We were already used to cold showers, which aren’t at all unpleasant in the Asian heat, but here they were of the bucket variety and you had to summon up the courage to chuck cool rain water over yourself.

We shared this beautiful bay with no more than ten guests, giving us a good stretch of the beach to ourselves each day. We mostly spent our time relaxing in hammocks, reading, and swimming in the crystal clear waters, but one morning we ventured into the jungle to seek out a nearby fishing village. We passed coconut groves, cashew woods and the occasional mango tree, laden with ripe fruit which dropped onto our path as we walked. The hostel’s owner had advised us to “just follow the path”, which seemed pretty straightforward, so we weren’t expecting to encounter several forks along the way. Consequently, we were amazed to reach the village after an hour or so’s walking, somehow having made the right decision at each turning.

It was traditional, with huts for houses and a rickety wooden bridge that ran across the inlet. Ramshackle fishing vessels were moored along the water’s edge, their brightly coloured paint peeling to reveal a spectrum of former coats. We stopped at a villager’s home-come-shop for a much needed iced coffee (it was a sweltering day). As we were leaving we passed two young boys playing on the sandy ground in the shade of a coconut tree. Proudly grinning, they dangled a couple of geckos in front of us that they’d tethered with makeshift string leads. It reminded me of something out of Just William. Boys will be boys!

There was nothing better than submerging ourselves in the cool(ish) sea as we returned, sweating buckets, from our excursion. Our morning’s activity warranted yet more relaxation, which is how we spent the remainder of our stay on this Edenic part of Koh Rong. Sadly, we fear Lonely Beach may not be lonely forever as the Cambodian government is keen to develop the whole island with an airport and a ring road in the pipeline. The hostel owners told us they have no permanent rights to the land and could be ordered to demolish the buildings any day. It was clearly a special time to be there, which made our stay all the more magical.

Lonely Beach

1km of beach to share with ten people

Sunset over the bay

Hammock

Jungle dorm

Admiring the view

Fishing Village

Boys will be boys