On the way to the caves we saw a terrible sight. This highway is known as the "Death Highway" because of the number of deaths in the area as a result of very intense fighting during the Vietnamese war, however today that name on are new tragic new origin. The bus travelling in front of us had a head on crash with a motor scooter. The driver was killed and trapped under the bus, the pillion passenger was thrown onto the road and I don't think would survive either. Within 10 minutes we were under way again and so was the rest of the traffic everybody just seemed to bypass it. It was a huge trip, we passed the DMZ and into North Vietnam ... we stopped at the caves down the river from the caves and boarded a boat. After about 30 minutes on the boat , it broke down and we drifted dangerously near the edge of the river. They put out a call for another boat and the second boat took about 20 minutes or so to come to our rescue and we transferred midstream into the other boat for the rest of the trip to the caves.
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We spent about 1 and a half hours in the Phong Nga cave at best. I managed to get quite a few good photos I think. Im looking forward to getting home to see how these photos come out actually.
Soon we were back in the boat for the trip out of the cave and up the river . The boat made it all away this time and we soon boarded the bus and started our horrendous 4 hour journey home. In fact it was not a bus there is a minivan analyst overload with all the with most uncomfortable .
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I certainly would not recommend anyone using this company again, however I did enjoy the caves and I got my photos. As a side note I am pleased that I did not ride myself there on a motorbike like I had planned to do. The traffic was shocking. And on top of this our driver spent much of the time on the wrong side road ... with on coming traffic ... you can see why people get killed here ... you really can. I got home about 7:30 p.m. And after that horrendous drive on the bus i need a big beer... i'm going to have a nice cold beer with my dinner and catch an early night for my flight tomorrow morning at 830 am to hanoi.
Recommendation : Stay in Dong Hoi for a night or even in the park itself ... to see more caves - its worth the visit, and you'll avoid a horrific long bus trip.
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