Vietnam: Exploring new caves in Quang Tri Province

Ruth, Adam and I were fortunate to have a trip to the neighbouring province of Quang Tri. In terms of tourism, Quang Tri is overshadowed by other provinces nearby and the local Peoples Committee are keen to improve this situation, as they have a small block of limestone and a few caves they invited us to look at these with a view to opening them up to tourists.

Cu Bai border area

We drove through stunning scenery (bypassing the Phong Nha Ke Bang National park) joining the Ho Chi Minh West road to get to the Cu Bai Border post where we were staying for the night.

Fifteen go caving!

Once there we were met by various members of the Tourism Department of the Peoples committee, the man in charge of the border post and various others.

Welcome to the jungle

At first were were sat in a large room, facing the officials, it felt like an interview! They explained their hopes and what the plans were for the next two days. Much shaking of hands occurred.

Our ward/bedroom

After the interview we were shown our accommodation for the night, a hospital opposite the border post, before lunch with the officials plus about twenty others. We were certainly being well looked after.

Home sweet Hospital

Lunch over and it was time to go caving, with fifteen Vietnamese! A fifteen minute walk from the base got us to the entrance to the first cave.

Hang Po Da

Hang Pô Da turned out to be quite large and had been used as an "Army Cave" during the American War and by various Vietnamese since then. The cave was just short of 900m long with a few nice formations along the way, but not enough to make a decent show cave.

Binh, in Hang Po Da

The Vietnamese had explored about half of the cave, stopping a a low section which obviously sumps in wet weather.

More Hang Po Da

Beyond this section the cave was generally of smaller proportions and few formations but it did have a good draft blowing out.

Hang Po Da, the pretty bit

We surveyed up to a low wet section where Adam was reluctant to progress so we sent Ruth for a look see. On her return she reported that the cave improved again but that she had stopped after about 80m at a difficult climb so I (and a load of Vietnamese) continued to the end. It was a tricky climb over a deep pool but I passed this to a final Aven/Chamber where the only way on was a 30m aid climb. End of cave! My estimated length for this section was 140m.

Arrival at the Bru Van Kieu village

We did a spot of photography on the way out before returning to our base for hot showers and a fine meal prepared by our hosts.

Village life

Breakfast was again provided before we drove for a few kilometres to a Bru Van Kieu village which was our drop off point for the second cave, from here it was a short walk of twenty minutes to the cave entrance, we were told this had not been explored before.

Preparing to enter Hang Ta Puong

We soon found out why as the cave, Hang Ta Puong, was an active stream cave which soon necessitated swimming, sometimes against a strong current where I found it difficult to make forward progress.

The dry entrance bit of Hang Ta Puong

An altogether different cave from the last one, again no good as a show cave but a fine sporting trip, just over 200m to where the way on was too tight above water.