Ruc Ca Roong

Friday 30th to Saturday 31st January.

This was a two day, one night trip to assess the possibility of running tours to Ruc Ca Roong, Hang Pygmy (known as Hang En to locals) and Hang Over. On the trip were Myself, Ruth, Ryan (the photographer), Bow (Oxalis Guide), Trinh (National Park representative) and the porters, An, Tu (the cook) and Shern.

The trip started badly when we were detained at our start point for over two hours as it seemed that we didn't have all the correct permissions, this was eventually sorted by having one of the Oxalis Directors driven up to us (over an hours drive away) to discuss the problem with the head of the local committee.

The Walk to Ruc Ca Roong

Once on our way it was an easy downhill walk through a cultivated area to a river, at this point the going got tougher as we followed the river on a sloping bank with hardly any path until we reached Ruc Ca Roong, a fine if short river cave. At the exit there was talk of staying the night but we persuaded the porters to carry on to Hang En Exit, two more hours of walking, which we reached just before dark. After eating, Ruth, Ryan, Bow and I explored the cave, rigging an awkward climb (protected by fence wire) to the Entrance, as it was dark we could go no further, so we returned to camp, reaching this by ten pm, time for bed! Hang En is a massive cave throughout, up to seventy metres high and ninety metres wide, at the exit are awesome bamboo  "walkways" used by locals to get to Swifts nests high up in the cliffs.

Ruc Ca Roong Entrance

The next morning was an early start as we had to be back at camp by twelve so that Ryan could catch his bus/train/plane back to Beijing. Nobody knew where the entrance to Hang Over was, Howard had said it was just three hundred metres away but Shern only knew a route that would take three hours, as we only had two before we had to turn around we decided to try to follow Howard's instructions and fortunately he was correct, Shern's route would have taken us to the other entrance to Hang Over, about two and a half kilometres away! Hang Over (at least the bit we saw) is a fantastic cave with fine formations but all too soon we had to turn around, is was a real pity that we didn't have more time.

Hang En (Pygmy) Exit

Back at the Exit to Hang En we had a quick spot of lunch before packing up for the long walk back. As a bonus we did get to go through another short section of cave, a downstream continuation of the Ruc Ca Roong cave which was part of our route back to the road. Trinh, the National Park guy, who must spend all of his time in an office in Dong Hoi, was completely knackered and struggled to make it out of the jungle, another half hour would have finished him off and we would probably have had to carry him!

The walk between Hang En and Ruc Ca Roong