After the wonders of the Coa Dai Holy Sea we boarded the bus and headed for the nearby Cu Chi tunnels.

The tunnels were originally constructed by the anti-colonial Viet Minh in the late 1940 as a place to store arms but they soon became valuable hiding places for them. Over a decade later the Viet Cong or Vietnamese Communists, many of them local villagers, controlling the area followed suit and went underground to fight the Americans. By 1965 250km of tunnels criss crossed the ground under the village of Cu Chi and surrounding area. The location of the tunnels made it easy for the Viet Cong to use them to infiltrate Saigon and one section even ran under the Americans Cu Chi military base.

Upon arrival at the tunnels we paid our entrance fee and were ushered into a room where we were shown a video of almost shameless anti-American propaganda. Afterwards our guide walked us around demonstrating a number of traps the Viet Cong used to capture and injure American soldiers trying to infiltrate the tunnels. Many of the traps involved swinging beds of nails designed to very painfully incapacitate anyone trying to get into the tunnels.

Walking around the forest the guide pointed out a number of bomb craters – something that was to become a familiar sight during our travels around Vietnam.

In the forest our fist stop was a tunnel that had been blocked up but with the entrance still remaining. It was a small square opening cleverly camouflaged with leaves and bark that lifted out of the ground to reveal a tunnel below. The opening was the original size the Viet cong would have used – in order to get into the hole it was necessary to put your hands above you head and squeeze your shoulders as tightly together as possible as you passed through the opening. A large man jumped down into the hole and reemerged with seemingly little difficulty. I decided to have a go and made it back out unscathed. Then it was Emily’s turn! Getting into the hole wasn’t a problem but getting out was different altogether. She had her camera case attached to her belt and didn’t think to take it off before getting into the hole. As she put her hands on the floor and lifted herself out of the hole the camera case caught under the rim of the narrow opening. She tried a few more times but each to no avail as Kat and I collapsed in fits of giggles. Seeing that Kat and I weren’t going to be of any use two men came over and took one of Emily’s arms each heaving her out of the hole. She emerged very embarrassed with her legs flailing about beneath her!

Once Emily had been set free we were lead to the section of tunnel we were able to crawl along. This section of tunnel had been widened to twice its original size of 80cm tall by 80cm wide to : “Accommodate the fuller frame of tourists,” but was still very, small, dark, hot and smelly! We were last into the tunnel allowing us time for our usual messing around and silly picture taking! At the entrance I spotted a very large centipede crawling into the blackness and knowing I was going to have to crawl along the floor this almost put me off. But Kat, who can be claustrophobic, soldiered on so dutifully I followed. It was a good job as just a few feet in there was no light whatsoever and we had to feel our way along. My camera lights up before it takes a picture so I used this to light the way along the tunnel making the crawl a little less daunting.

The tunnel stretches for 100 meters with an exit every 30 meters for people to escape though if the enclosed space become too much. Once we were inside and had begun moving along, despite the smell, heat and unidentified slimy patches on the floor, it wasn’t too bad; we bypassed each ’emergency’ exit until we reached the end of the tunnel.

For a one off the claustrophobic crawl wasn’t too bad but I’d have hated to crawl along something half that size and for days on end – horrific. Making it to the end was definitely a relief it was nice to feel some cool air and breath something a bit fresh. Being in the tunnel gives you a whole new appreciation of the levels of endurance these soldiers would have needed to be able to stay down there for days on end and in some cases fight the Americans inside the tunnels!

After emerging from the tunnels we discovered that our whole tour group, most of them not having crawled the full length of the tunnel, had already dusted themselves down and headed back to the bus. So late as usual we went and found the bus home.

* Posted by j150vsc on 01/09/2007.