Cu Chi Tunnels - Vietnam's famous tunnel network!

Another easy trip from Ho Chi Minh City is a visit to the Cu Chi Tunnels, located 75km from the city, which can be visited on a half day trip (US$4) or on a full day trip which includes the Cao Dai Holy See at Tay Ninh in the morning (US$7-8). This temple complex is a place of pilgrimage to many Vietnamese and overseas followers of Caodaism and is quite spectacular so it's well worth taking the full day tour to see both sights.

The infamous Cu Chi tunnel system originally stretched all the way from Saigon to the Ho Chi Minh Trail at the Cambodian border. The tunnels were used by the Viet Cong (South Vietnamese Communists who wore the peasant garb of black pyjamas which made then indistinguishable from local farmers) as a base for fierce fighting. The tunnels consist of three levels and were dug out of hard, red clay and were surrounded by booby traps.

The total network spans over 250 kilometres and stetches from HCMC to the Cambodian border. The top level of one of the tunnels is open to tourists (although slightly enlarged to allow head room for Western tourists) and it provides an insight into what it must have been like to live there with its trap doors, living areas, smokeless kitchens, storage facilities, ammunition factories & hospitals. The Americans were never able to take these tunnels even after some of the most intense bombardments of the Vietnamese war. 40,000 Vietnamese people perished here.

After visiting the tunnels and the Ben Duoc War Memorial, challenge yourself at the shooting range for US$1 per bullet - although one would think there'd already been enough shooting around here to last a lifetime!

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