Cu Chi Tunnels
HCM-city Province
Cu Chi district is located in the northwest of Ho Chi Minh City, about 33 km from the city center and it is one of the five suburban districts of the South Vietnamese megalopolis.
If the tenacious spirit of the Vietnamese can be symbolized by a place, few sites are more emblematic than Cu Chi. To see what happened, you must visit the network of tunnels that became legendary in the 1960s during the Vietnam War.
At its peak, the tunnel system stretched from the South Vietnamese capital to the Cambodian border.
The best time to visit Cu Chi
It is hot all year round. The best time to visit Cu Chi is from January to May and from November to December
The highest average temperature in Cu Chi is 35°C in March and the lowest is 31°C in July
What to see, what to do…?
Built by the Viet Cong in the 1940s to protect themselves from French air raids during the Indochina conflict, the Cu Chi tunnels stretch underground (in the Cu Chi district alone) for more than 250 km. An immense network of underground galleries in the form of honeycombs and narrow tunnels dug by hand to then defend against the American “war machine”, the Cu Chi tunnels, long closed to the public, today constitute one of great historical sites of the Vietnam War.
Although they are technically part of the same tunnel network, Ben Duoc and Ben Dinh are two different sites to visit the Cu Chi tunnels. The Ben Duoc site may be a little further from Ho Chi Minh City, but it’s less touristy and more true to what the tunnels were like during the Vietnam War. The Ben Dinh Cu Chi tunnels, on the other hand, are mostly reconstructions and are the most visited.
Top things to do in Cu Chi:
- Visit the tunnels.
- Visit the Cu Chi Wild Animal Rescue Center.