Vietnam

Epic Travel → Asia & the South Pacific → Vietnam

Vietnam is becoming an increasingly popular travel destination as people realize that the country is cheap, beautiful, and tourist-friendly (both in terms of amenities and in terms of attitude). The people are remarkably frank about the Vietnam War, but there’s no hostility. It’s considered one of those terrible things from the past, and no one today is to blame for it, so there it is. It’s just a part of our history. We should learn from it, mourn and honor the lost, but otherwise just move forward. The only place we found any anti-America propaganda was in a very old introductory film we watched at the Cu Chi Tunnels (it must have been made in the 80’s if not the late 70’s), and we found it fascinating (rather than offensive) to see the US through their eyes.

We came to Vietnam solely because we managed to get onto one of the earliest expeditions into Son Doong; as soon as I heard that it had been opened for tourists, I rushed home and sent out applications, and was overjoyed when we got spots. At the time, the trip required 7 days/7 nights (current expeditions are two days shorter), so we had limited time for the rest of Vietnam. There’s a lot we could do on a subsequent trip and would absolutely love to come back.