Cho Moi & Tuc Dup

Thursday I was down because of the champion’s league final, however by Friday I was eagerly anticipating what Cho Moi town was going to be like. My students from the TC class had arranged for me to visit Cho Moi (Newmarket) with them. Not really knowing anything else I met up with them at about 9 in the morning. We headed out to the ferry to cross the Mekong and still no one would answer my questions.

Once across the river we proceeded along towards Cho Moi however it appeared that they were lost. I thought we knew exactly where we were, though I still didn’t know where we were going. We decide to turn off the main road and head down this dirt track and over the wooden bridges. These bridges always make me scared as they are poorly constructed and high with no or minimal railings. To make it worse the time we crossed was low tide amplifying my fear of heights. Happy to report no problems and after 3 more of these bridges we arrived at our destination, the monitor’s house.

We arrived at his sister’s engagement party and it looked like we were late. Not long after we arrived we tucked into some food and talked about marriage. My students kept asking me about when I would get married. No matter how much I tried to dodge the topic it always came back, like a boomerang. After eating the karaoke started and the guests started singing traditional Delta music. We thought it was time to escape and my students had planned something else to do. Once again I was ignorant as I didn’t hear clearly because of the loud music.

We hopped on the motorbikes again and headed towards Long Xuyen. I was surprised when it looked like we were heading towards Chau Doc (near the border with Cambodia). We came to this big intersection and turned left into Tri Ton district. I was amazed that we had to pay a toll to use this road, as they sure don’t use the money to repair the road. It was narrow and full of pot holes. Travelling on this road often made me afraid that I would fall off the bike.

When we arrived in Tri Ton we waited for our group to catch up. It was here I was enlightened, we were going to Tuc Dup Hill. This is a famous site in An Giang as a symbol of resistance and is locally known as two million dollar hill. It definitely had a very nationalistic feel to the site and a reasonable amount of propaganda. I tried to ignore it, and found that it is an amazing place. We started looking for the crocodiles that were advertised yet all we could find were ostriches and a horse. For some reason I felt overly excited about seeing the horse (or more likely it was a pony) as it is the first one I have seen in VN. I really missed it when I couldn’t see it on the way back, yet a little further on I saw that it was giving rides around the tourist park. I thought it was carrying too much wait with two grown adults on its back.

We started to climb the mountain and after about 75 metres or more (it was hot in the sun as the mountain was facing west and it was about 2 in the afternoon) we decided to follow the track into the mountain. We descended into the caves and it was claustrophobic. Lots of boulders just resting on each other, forming solid caves like the keystone principle in an arch. It was very cool in the caves a welcome relief to the heat outside. We trekked around snaking through the caves for about 30 mins. In some places I thought that I would not be able to pass because of my size. Once we came out we had a relaxing walk down the mountain. The photo can not do justice to the beauty of the view.

We finished the day with a few ice cold soft drinks and dwarf coconuts. No one told me that inside the fruit, which resembled lychees in look and texture, were filled with coconut water and managed to shower myself with it. As we left Tuc Dup hill we passed many Khmer style buildings which are very different from the more traditional VN style we usually see. We headed back home to Long Xuyen at about 4 in the afternoon with the threat of rain not far off.