A Day Trip to the Củ Chi Tunnels from Ho Chi Minh City

The Cu Chi tunnels in Vietnam are a really popular destination for visitors to Ho Chi Minh City for good reason. Underground tunnels are just really fucking cool. There were over 250 kms (155 mi) of tunnels in the region, but they weren't built just for the Vietnam war. It seems like an impossible engineering feat to dig the out for the war against America, but construction on them actually started in the 1940's during the French colonial war for independence.

But as an American, this one hit me a lot harder than I thought it would. I was in the military myself—way too young to have been in this theater of war, but nonetheless, seeing a war museum in a country your nation went to war with was a completely different experience than anything I was used to.

Outside of the tunnels there was a lot of destroyed American vehicles on display

I was the only American in my tour group. It was all Brits and Australians. Now, I was not offended whatsoever by what the guide said. He was an excellent guide. I just found the cavalier attitude with which he explained things kind of jarring. I mean, after all, everything here was designed to kill the enemy, i.e., Americans.

And again, it was totally fine and all factual. Most of the Vietnamese population is too young to even remember the war. Outside of grumpy 75-year-old Vietnamese men (like Hank Hill's dad in America), there is no animosity.

A very cute display about life in the tunnels. It has a dude chilling in a hammock.

The tour is mostly from the point of view of a Vietnamese soldier.

I knew these existed, but I always pictured a four-foot-ish shaft where a guy just ducked his head, jogged through to escape, and then went back to a base later in the day.

Boy, was I fucking wrong.

They lived in these things for months. Airflow was a constant challenge. Food, light, and a place to shit were all hard to come by.

They would try to hide airflow vents like this. It did not stop bugs (like the millipede pictured above) or scorpions from entering.

These were the tunnels that tourists were able to go through. We had to squat and duck-walk through them, even though they have been widened by about 50% for tourists. I don't really consider myself a claustrophobic person, but I definitely did not like being down there and not seeing daylight.

Even the entrances were a nightmare: extremely small holes in the ground, maybe 1x2 ft. You would get in waist-deep, hold the hatch covered in leaves over your head, and then lower yourself all the way in.

No fat boys or big-titted girls were allowed in the Viet Cong.

During the tour, you get to go through several pretty short tunnels. But at one stop, we had the option of taking a 15-meter, 30-meter, or 50-meter route.

By this point, about half of my tour group decided they had seen enough and opted to skip it entirely. A few did the 15-meter and two brave souls did the 50 (that is half a fucking football field!).

I was the only one who did the 30, and I am glad I was the only one.

Duck-walking in the Vietnam heat inside an underground tunnel is FUCKING hard. Knees be damned, I gave up and dropped to my hands and knees to crawl the last few feet.

Luckily no one saw that, so I climbed up the stairs saying "it wasn't that bad," even though my shirt was twice as wet with sweat as when I went in.

Oh... I forgot to mention I left my backpack full of water in the van because I heard it was hard to navigate the tunnels with one. (It is, but I would recommend just carrying a single water bottle in your hand for this tour.)

This was kind of interesting. A lot of the stuff the Viet Cong used was made from discarded American gear. They made shoes out of old tires, which to be honest do not look that uncomfortable. But like all things in war: let us make this suck more. If you look closely at these sandals, the one on the left is normal, but the sole on the right is put on backwards. They would wear these to disguise the direction of their footprints.

After the shoemaker, the last stop on the tour was a display of about ten traps the Viet Cong used.

I was so enthralled by the guide explaining them that I forgot to take pictures of all of them. But at the same time, I was kind of repulsed. I get it... war is hell. No one enjoys invaders in their country.

The traps were equal parts brilliant and sadistic.

A land mine is designed to maim rather than kill. A dead soldier removes one person from the battle, while an injured soldier removes two or three to attend to him. I get that. I also get that the Viet Cong did not have access to factories making land mines, so they just made do with improvised weapons following the same train of thought.

Logically, I cannot give a good reason why these traps were any worse than a standard land mine, but fuck... they were pretty medieval.

I am sure everyone has heard of the pit filled with spikes covered in shit or poison.

Deadfall. May or may not be smeared with nasty shit.

There was a trap that had two rotating cylinders filled with spikes above a pit. That wasn't meant for someone to survive. Just inflict pain before killing to strike fear.

There was another placed above a door. You'd have to see it in action to really understand the full effect, but it was a board with a bunch of nails that swung down when a door was kicked in. Now you may think "oh just stop with the butt of your gun or something" but it was particularly clever because it had a hinge about two thirds of the way down. So even if you do catch it, the bottom half will still fling up and catch you in the dick area.

There was another that was designed to catch people for interrogation, it had metal spikes pointing downward at a 45 degree angle, so you could get in but not out. BUT to add insult to injury it had an eight inch spike at the bottom pointed up so not only are you trapped but got a big ass nail in your foot for good measure.

I don't know why but I found this to be the worst one (even worse than the "dick-hitter"). It is designed to catch you at the armpits and leave you dangling.

After all of this carnage, you do have a chance to spread some of your own.

This is one of the few places in the country where you can shoot a gun, but it is not actually that cool. There is a range where you can shoot a few military weapons, but they are bolted to a mount, so all you can really do is pull the trigger. It is also pretty expensive: you pay per bullet, coming out to about 60,000 VND ($2.25 USD) a shot.

It was kind of funny, though: there was a dog hanging out right by the firing line who did not even flinch at the gunshots, while all of the tourists jumped every time.

In closing, this was a very cool trip.

It is relatively short. It takes about 90 minutes to get there and you spend maybe three hours on site.

I would say 90 minutes back, but that is not true. This was my third day trip in Vietnam, and I have started to notice a pattern. On the way back, the bus will stop at a shop to show you how locals make paintings or crafts, which immediately leads into a gift shop.

I watched about 90 seconds of their demonstration and then just walked back to the starting point. Luckily, the place had a snack bar that was not jacked up to tourist prices.

I bought a beer for 40,000 VND ($1.53 USD) and a sandwich for 20,000 VND ($0.75 USD) and played on my phone.

Having to sit around for 45 minutes sucked, but I was still back at my place by 2:00 PM after an 8:00 AM pickup.