DMZ

Just outside of Hue we spent a few hours on a Demilitarised Zone tour which was pretty amazing, especially going through a complex of tunnels where entire villages had moved underground to survive the American bomb attacks. Unlike the Cu Chi tunnels near Saigon, these ones weren't reconstructions - they were built closer to the end of the war when the people in that area had amassed enough knowledge about tunnel building to make them deep enough not to be destroyed by bombs.




There was also some unexploded ordnance around which our guide told us not to touch or go anywhere near. Of course. Who the hell would be stupid enough to do such a thing?


Then there was the obligatory two hour argument with our guide who promised to take us to the most famous war cemetary, but ended up just pulling over at a random municipal cemetary by the side of the road and told us to take photos over the fence, and then tried to charge us three times the going rate for the tour. We pointed out that our guidebooks said the tour should cost around 10 bucks but he breezily brushed aside our protests and declared this price was "Impossible! Not true."

He seemed a little deflated when he dropped us off in Hue... right outside a travel agent which had a huge sign up promising the same tour for 8 dollars.