We headed out to the Paradise Caves, some 14 km from Son Trach, which stretches some 35 km, but we are only going in about 1 km. This all-day tour including lunch costs about $50 USD.
After a 1 km walk to the caves, we first had to climb 534 stairs to get to the entrance.
From there we entered the small opening on wooden stairs and walkways. We encountered an amazing scene that they had well-lit so you could find your way as well as take pictures without flash. Our guide, Viet, said that this was the second-largest cave in the world—just after Mammoth caves in the USA. The walkway extended into the cave for about 1km, but the cave continues for an amazing 31km.
After descending from the opening, we entered a huge chamber like a cathedral with huge stalactites hanging from the ceiling and stalagmites spreading out on the canyon floor.
Some of the color changes were from the different elements like magnesium which left a blue-green hue to the stalagmite.
Crowds were thin so we could linger at the popular formations.
We then began our climb back out to the opening of the cave which you can barely see near the center of the picture below.
Heading back we took advantage of the electric buggies rather than walking back the 1km to the parking area.
It was then on to lunch where our group would split up with some going to the Dark Cave with its zip lines and mud baths for the adventuresome.
Two couples and I took the easy route with a lunch at a restaurant next to the boats that would take us up to the water cave called Pha Nha Cave. It was an enjoyable one-hour trip to the cave entrance where we passed people gathering river weeds to feed their fish farms and travelers.
I noticed that the rowers and captains of these boats were mostly women. Our guide explained that the men had gone overseas or to the big cities to earn more money and left the women behind to raise their families and do work like this.
Tourism is really down so the rowers and captains, sign up for work and wait for their turn to work. Right now it is a very long wait and you can see as we head up the river all of the boats that are idle.
As we enter the cave, the captain cuts the engine and the rowers take overtaking us 1 km through this water cave and back out.
The scenery was beautiful, and we enjoyed seeing the kayakers who had just finished their 8 km trip through the water cave.
We got off our boat inside the cave so we could explore some of the massive stalactites and stalagmites of this cave as we walked back to the cave entrance.
During the Vietnam War, portions of the cave were a hospital, safe from the never-ending bombing by the US.
This was truly an amazing day of seeing some of the more unique creations of Mother Nature,
I have recently uploaded all of my travel videos to YouTube now that they allow longer uploads and you may want to see my travel adventures there. That link is
https://www.youtube.com/c/huntforgold.
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