Prior to traveling to Vietnam, my only experience with caves was the hours spent wandering Rock Tunnel and Mt. Moon in Pokémon Fire Red on my Gameboy (to which I referred as my Gamegirl, since Gameboy seemed overly sexist and exclusive to me). Nothing made my heart pound like these damn caves, Pokémon jumping out at every turn to challenge you and kill all your Pokémon and ensure that you never find your way out. I found myself wandering in circles, panicking as I descended deeper into the endless black abyss.
But I digress.
Vietnam is home to a staggering number of caves, including Hang Son Doong, the largest cave in the entire world. Turns out that caves are a pretty big deal in Vietnam. Who knew? Hang Son Doong, as well as some more of Vietnam’s most famous caves, is located in Phong Nha-Ke Bang National Park, central Vietnam’s most captivating gem and an unmissable UNESCO World Heritage Site (if you know what’s good for you). And to think I had no idea of its existence, and almost blew right past it in favor of Vietnam’s large cities. Here’s a tip: Vietnam’s most magical places, the places you’ll remember for years to come, are not within the hustle and bustle of the biggest cities. They are the country’s natural wonders, the places that make you want to grab Mother Nature and squeeze her tight with all your love.
Phongnha Discovery Tours
After chatting with fellow travelers who I met along the way, I decided to buy a bus ticket at my hotel in Hue and stop in Dong Hoi before heading up to Hanoi. Dong Hoi is a cute little coastal city outside of the national park, where the sunsets are beautiful and my hostel gave me a room all to myself (which turned out to be a blessing as the Vietnamese food was catching up to me and I had been spending an exorbitant amount of time on the toilet at that point. Backpacking is not glamorous, let me tell you). I had also stumbled across Phongnha Discovery Tours online, and they are based out of Dong Hoi, so it seemed like a good place to park myself for the night.
Tours are not necessary for a day at Phong Nha-Ke Bang National Park, but I opted to get the chance to meet new people rather than venturing out on my own. At $60 for the Paradise Cave/Dark Cave tour, which included transportation, food, entrance to the park and caves, plus kayaking and ziplining, it was worth it to me.
With my “fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants” mentality on this trip, I had to change my tour reservation three times to account for my ever-changing plans, and the company did not seem annoyed with me at all. Thank you, Dory, for your incredible patience.
Like most of Vietnam, I could have easily booked the same exact tour at the front desk of my accommodations, Buffalo Hostel, the night before, but I decided to book in advance to be safe. Okay, so maybe not ALL that “fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants.” I’m not that free-spirited, even though I try to make people think I am.
The tour company has tons of different options, including daily and multi-day tours, with different combinations of caves on the itinerary. Hang Son Doong is unfortunately not on any of the itineraries, because that cave is limited to tours with Oxalis to protect it from mass development. Only ten people are allowed to embark on a Hang Son Doong expedition, and the company only runs one expedition per week February through August. Plus it costs several thousand dollars per person, and I doubt that is in most modest backpackers’ budgets.
I rolled out of bed the morning of my trip into the national park, my GoPro charged and ready to go, and hopped on a bus alongside a British couple that I had befriended at breakfast. I don’t know what it was about my trip to Vietnam and being taken in by young, tall British couples, but I SERIOUSLY nailed down the art of third-wheeling. Or maybe I was so small and squeaky that their paternal/maternal instincts kicked in and they felt it was their duty to bring me along with them. Either way, I love them all.
Paradise Cave
Our first stop on our tour was Paradise Cave, the longest cave in the national park at 31 kilometers, filled with spectacular stalactites and stalagmites. The entrance to the cave is tight and hidden, and was only discovered in 2005 and open to tourists since 2010. There was a short ride on a golf cart followed by a bit of a steep, uphill climb through the jungle to reach the entrance, THEN followed by nearly 700 wooden steps down into the cave.
Make sure you hop on a Stairmaster for a week or so before a visit to Paradise Cave, and definitely slap on some deodorant.
Once you finally get down there, WOWZA. What a way to lose my cave virginity. Only the first kilometer of the cave is open to the public, but every inch of that one kilometer offers some of the most otherworldly beauty I have ever seen.
Even with the thick throngs of tourists walking the pathway, the cave feels absolutely massive. I had always feared claustrophobia would kick in on any caving expeditions I might go on, but this was so well-lit and so gigantic that I never even thought about the fact that I was deep inside a cold, dark cavern. We spent about an hour here, but probably could have taken even longer to really soak it all in.
Lunch
Upon leaving Paradise Cave, my camera full of several hundred fresh new photos, we were taken to the Dark Cave restaurant, where we feasted on a giant plate of meat and rice and noodles. Rice paper was provided for making our own spring rolls, as were chopsticks (the Vietnamese women on the tour sat back and pointed and laughed as we struggled to eat the sticky rice with the chopsticks, which is cool. Who needs self esteem anyway?).
The amount of food was obscene and didn’t quite compare to some of the other meals I had in Vietnam, but some of them, including every single meal that I ate in Hoi An, were hard to top.
Dark Cave
With our bellies filled and bloated, we changed into swimwear and were strapped into harnesses and helmets for ziplining to the mouth of Dark Cave. We climbed up a tower and hooked in, zipping over the impossibly still river and landing in the emerald waters. It was a short swim to the entrance of the cave, and then a bit of a trek into its depths.
The cave is called Dark Cave for a reason: it is pitch black and full of mud, which made maneuvering the slippery floors inside a bit difficult. My ass met the cave floor on more than one occasion and I ended up with bruises all over my feet from slipping into sharp rocks.
The inside of the cave is nothing compared to the beauty of Paradise Cave, but there was a huge mud pit in the middle of it for mud baths that (almost) made up for it. It was like floating in the Dead Sea in there; lose your footing and you’d be swung onto your back, stuck at the surface of the muddy waters like you were a balloon full of air. One girl lost her balance and ended up grabbing onto everything and everyone in her path trying to get her feet back on the ground. I’ve never experienced anything like it.
After exiting the cave again, we had time for kayaking, swimming, and traversing an obstacle course over the water complete with rope bridges and swings. Maybe not for everyone, but it is exactly the kind of way I want to spend my afternoon. Even if I was removing mud from my bikini top for a good 20 minutes afterwards.
After drying off and changing, and after randomly being provided with an entire bottle of rum and several cans of Coke (the perfect end to a perfect day), we boarded a bus back to Dong Hoi. I went to the train station to hop on an overnight train to Hanoi shortly afterwards, but not before ordering a grilled cheese from the hostel; Vietnamese food is literally the best food I have ever had in my entire 25 years of life, but I usually eat 5 string cheeses a day at home and was experiencing withdrawal.
The time in Phong Nha was short-lived. I came, I saw, I caved (at least a little bit). Don’t bypass this incredible World Heritage Site during your time in Vietnam, especially when Phongnha Discovery Tours makes it so easy to see so much in a short amount of time.
Have you ever been to Phong Nha? Which caves were your favorite?
