Cu Chi

Our flight from Ho Chi Minh City is not until 8:20 pm so we had some time to spare. Having seen enough Museums we decided to visit the Cu Chi Tunnels.

I put it here somewhere!

We booked a coach tour from our hotel, half day only but it was a slow start and we didn't finish picking up customers from the city until over an hour had passed. We had a hard sell on the bus for a return by speed boat, which we took as it was going to be quicker that the bus.

Ah, here it is.

Our guide first showed us some of the tunnel entrances which were well hidden.

Bamboo spike pit trap thingy

Then we saw some of the traps that the Viet Cong set for the Americans (nasty).

Cu Chi Tunnel, enlarged for fat Westerners

The tunnels were small and hot, even though the one we went into was thirty percent bigger than actual size (so westerners can fit!). In total there are about 250 Km of tunnels in the Cu Chi complex, which was built over three levels. The tunnel we went into was only 100m in length, but it was still too long for some!

Up and down the river.

After the tunnels, it was back to HCMC, by speedboat for us, no aircon, but there was certainly a good breeze.

Speedy boat

The river was pretty deserted at first but as we got closer to HCMC we saw more boats (of all shapes and sizes).

Slow boat

Some were traditional wooden build but there were other giant metal ones.

Crash? Or just good friends.

Banana boat? No, it's a melon boat.

Once back in HCMC it was straight to the airport to start our long haul back to Blighty, arriving at Manchester at 07:40.