Wow..... We've just spent two days trekking in pristine jungle, crossing the river several times, sometimes practically swimming through it, to reach the worlds third largest cave. After feeling fatigued with travelling, this has rejuvenated both of us. It was an amazing two days. I've figured out I don't like not doing things, I'm not keen on busy cities, and what I really like is the more adventurous stuff, in rural locations! As China doesn't really offer any of this, no wonder I was starting to feel a tad worn out. We've met a few people in Vietnam who have all said they felt the same in China and needed time to re-charge.

The cave complex which includes the worlds largest cave, was discovered by a local person in 1990 when he was poaching and logging in the jungle, but was only confirmed to be what it is in 2009 when the British Caving Society explored it, once the local man could actually remember where it was.

Now only one company, Oxalis, has a licence to visit the cave. Due to small group numbers, only around 3000 people have ever seen the cave. We felt very privileged. It was also pretty amazing sharing the vast cavern with only five other people, plus the guide and porters.

At the start of the trek it was a steep descent to the jungle floor down a muddy path. The seven of us in the group; me, Tony and five others, were trying to keep clean and when we reached the first stream, were doing everything we could to avoid getting wet. A few river crossings later that all changed and we were happy to chuck ourselves into it and wade through in waist high water, fighting the currents to stay upright. By the end of the trek, the same streams we had been jumping over were waded through without hesitation, all thoughts of locating suitable stepping stones forgotten.

We trekked through a minority village, Ban Doong, with houses on wooden stilts with thatched roofs, stopping to say hello to the villagers.

Towards the end of the day we reached the mouth of the cave. We donned hard hats and head torches and scrambled up a rock face and could see further in, across a lake to a beach area, our campsite for the night. The campsite was 500m in, the cave itself stretches back 1.6km and the highest point is 140m high.

We swam through the lake and being wet already, changed into swimwear and went for a proper splash around in the pitch black, all of us feeling slightly apprehensive about what else was in the water with us.

Our guide and porters brought in a small tree and decorated it like a Christmas tree, placing a present for each of us on its boughs. We were also given Christmas hats to help us feel even more festive and then a bottle of wine was brought out with the feast they prepared. The feast included proper chips and spinach amongst other things. I was very happy! Even happier when a second bottle of wine was produced!

The next morning, on Christmas Eve, after a breakfast of pancakes and spring rolls, we headed further into the cave to explore some more. The best bit was wading through rivers in the pitch black, only our head torches illuminating the way.

At midday we broke out into sunlight once more and started our return trek through the jungle, sun shining, the lush green jungle looking pretty perfect against the bright blue sky, arriving back in Phang Nha at 5pm.

The jungle is pretty much untouched and the nearest village, Phang Nha, is still developing as a little tourist town and as such there are only a handful of basic guest houses and a few little bars so it's rather nice. The standard of accommodation leaves a little to be desired and on our first night our room had a dirty bathroom floor, dirty sheets and no hot water. We rectified this when we returned from the trek as having not had a shower for three days, there was no way I could go without hot water any longer. Plus, it was Christmas!

As it was Christmas Eve we headed across the road to a well established bar where everyone hangs out and took part in the quiz and listened to Philippino singers serenade us with Christmas songs.

We had wanted to stay a little way out of the town at The Farmstay, but this was booked up months in advance. We decided to rent bikes on Christmas Day and cycle the 9km out to it and beyond, to the shack that serves cold beer and then another shack where you choose your chicken & they then roast it for you. The Farmstay were also serving Christmas dinner and had a band playing Christmas tunes and had said we could join them. Plus, two of the girls from the trek were staying there but the torrential rain forced us to abandon that idea and we spent Christmas Day doing not very much. Until The Farmstay opened five years ago, this area had never seen a westerner. As it's still off the beaten track, getting there/away is a bit of a pain. It's not too bad from Hué or Hanoi which are on the main sleeper bus route but if you want to head south to Hoi An, as we do, it involves a rather convoluted bus journey which they don't tell you about at the time of booking your tickets! We caught the bus at 4.30am on Boxing Day, the driver blasting his horn every few seconds so you couldn't relax and sleep, and arrived in Hué at 8.30am. We had been advised the bus then goes onto Hoi An at 11am.

We got off and were duly informed the bus would pick us up at 1pm! At 1.15pm a taxi turned up to collect us to take us to the bus station where we were ushered onto another bus which left at 1.30pm. Six of us didn't have a clue what was happening or where we were going. We just went with it, hoping we eventually arrive in Hoi An, albeit around six hours later than planned!

Just after we arrived off the early bus, 2 lads told us they would get us on the 9.30am bus so we could avoid the wait. We jumped on their motorbikes with all of our luggage, first time I've been on one, with a very loose helmet too so not very safe, and whizzed to two bus offices. No room for us so they dropped us at another office where no one could really explain what was happening, encouraging us to purchase another ticket with a different company. They tried charging us for the ride too! We decided to walk back to where the bus had dropped us where the owner welcomed us back and asked if they tried to get us to hand over more money for a different bus company. We should have seen that coming. At least we tried to get away earlier, it cost us no money after we refused to give them any, and it wasted a bit of time!

We're now crawling along at less than 20mph down a clear duel carriageway. The scenery is stunning which is just as well as I imagine this is going to be a long journey! How many hours will it take to travel 60miles?