Wednesday Night Caving Club goes to Hang Son Doong

WNCC in shirts and trousers

It's been a very busy Month here in Phong Nha, hence the lack of posts on this blog. The Bi-annual Vietnam caving expedition is taking place at the moment so if we're not in Son Doong, we are out exploring new caves (I'll do a few more posts on this as and when I have time).

Ahh, sunbeams

Darren Mackenzie is out here with the expedition so there are currently three members of the WNCC in Vietnam. Darren wanted to see Hang Son Doong, so we took him on a three day jolly (on a Wednesday of course!).

Bats

This was to be a trip with no porters, Vietnamese or other clients, going to the exit, down the Great Wall of Vietnam and through the cave to Hang En, three days and two nights in total.

Bat

As we were passing Nuoc Nut, it would have been a shame to miss that so we had a quick look. The water levels had dropped significantly since my last visit but otherwise the cave was the same, except, at the section where there is still chest deep wading through water, there was a colony of bats (bigger than the ones we had previously seen in this cave).

Darren at a waterfall

I was a little worried about finding the exit to Hang Son Doong as I hadn't been there since last year, so we had to be quick with little time for photographs, but I did manage to shoot a couple of half decent images which gives an idea of the cave.

Nuoc Nit formations

We left the cave at 2pm which gave us plenty of time to find Son Doong before it got dark. As it turned out, finding the exit was straight forward and only took an hour.

Son Doong Exit entrance!

The exit is a huge slope down before climbing back up to an area which contains many cave pearls and the calcited bones of a deer.

Inside looking out

We traveled quickly through the cave to Camp Two where we were to spend the night, dumping our gear we continued to Doline two so that we could have a quick look at the other passage which enters here, this is not part of the regular tour so none of us had been here before.

Jungle

The passage goes no-where (as we had been told) but it did give us a nice view back into the jungle that is Doline Two.

Hang Son Doong, other passage

We were back at camp by six, where we enjoyed a fine meal of (double helpings) My Tom (noodles), this was one of the disadvantages of having no porters to carry our food and cook for us. Normally, Camp Two is totally dry, but because of the heavy mist the whole campsite was damp and dripping water. This was a problem as we had planned to sleep on the floor. After much faffing we managed to construct a "tent" using a tarpaulin, a bench and the table.

'Tent'

The next morning we woke early for a breakfast of porridge and fruit before setting off for Hang En, the plan was to be in the oxbow when the Son Doong tour was ascending the slope (so they wouldn't see us).

More Doline Two jungle

After breakfast we washed up and tidied up the camp before an early start, we wanted to get to the iconic stalagmites well before the other group got there.

Iconic Stall

As it turned out we arrived with so much time to spare that we had to slow down our progress considerably. This meant we had plenty of time for photography and were able to try out some different locations.

Oxbow

Even so, we were through the oxbow early and just missed the last of the customers, but we met some of the porter team which gave them quite a shock! Two of the porters were still at Camp One and they provided us with coffee and tea before we went to look at the fossil passage area. Just before this is an obvious passage in the wall which I've always meant to look at but have never been able to while Clients are present. This was an easy, if sharp, climb up to a passage which ended when it overlooked the fossil passage. A further climb up gained a similar passage, again with a window to the fossil passage below, but this time there was another way off to the left. This was a beautiful descending phreatic tube which ended at boulders and a 7m pitch down to a large passage which we couldn't get to (no rope!).

Oxbow Rope Climb

After that little bit of excitement it was back to the standard tour route, stopping for a few more pictures, again, trying to do things a little bit different. We spent the night in Hang En, joining a Hang En tour for evening meal and breakfast before a fast two hour walk up the hill for our 10 am pick-up.

Looking back to the Hand of Dog view point

Although we have both done Hang Son Doong many times, this was a very enjoyable trip and it was refreshing to be in the cave with no Porters or clients, the silence at Camp Two was particularly memorable. I think Darren enjoyed it too.

Second river crossing