There are two aspects of a trip to Hamburger Hill from Hue: getting to Aluoi from Hue and getting up to the top of Hamburger Hill from Aluoi. Each is important, and each presents different challenges and rewards.
Getting to Aluoi from HueThe trip to Aluoi is interesting itself. It’s only about 60 km from Hue as the crow flies, but the actual travel time from Hue is much more. The roads from Hue are paved, but very bumpy; they also tend to follow the wandering curves of the rivers along the way. It helps to have a relatively light meal before you go!
There are compensations for such difficulties, of course. One which might not be immediately apparent is that on these roads, you get to see the real Vietnam — not the cleaned up, modernized version that you sometimes face in the cities. This is how people really live in Vietnam, and it is refreshing to see it without the polishing and falseness and bowing. Since these are rural areas, largely untouched by the years except for the roads and modern communications, the people are very attractive and friendly. People sitting on the side of the road will wave to you as you go by, and you can see the water buffaloes and the chickens and the wash hanging out while the people talk and plant rice and go about their business. This is much more relaxing and refreshing than being made to feel nervous by people putting on a performance for you.
Once you get to Aluoi, you see a lot of things you don’t expect. First, all the pavement is smoothed out; it’s like this semi-American suburb in the middle of the Central Highlands of Vietnam. But it also has cattle and goats and chickens in people’s yards, and a general sense of informality which I like: it is attractive and unpretentious.
Once past Aluoi, a road of packed gravel takes you past several farmsteads, to a turnoff where there is a road of packed rocks that leads you up towards the hills. You get out there and walk up the road, past more farms, which appear to be primarily populated by the Montagnard people.
The packed rocks disappear after about a half-mile, and the road becomes a relatively level dirt road. This takes you past more farmsteads, which have beautiful flowers next to them as well. You can play around with the goats, who are fun and very friendly, at about the half-mile mark. The nature of the road is misleading, however. Once you get past the farmsteads, the road becomes steep, and it gets quite a bit steeper as you go towards Hamburger Hill. The distance from where you are let off to the peak at Hamburger Hill is at least four miles. (It was impossible for me to measure it directly).
These are four extremely difficult miles to walk for many Americans, because of how steep the inclines become. Even at the second mile, the incline is about 20º, and gets much steeper as you go towards the peak. My guess is that at around the third mile, the incline is at least 30º for an entire mile — and it could be more than that. This morning we watched a truck take five minutes to climb 400 feet in that general vicinity, so you can imagine how this is for people!
Between the second and third miles, shade becomes scarce. So while making this very steep climb, you are out in the open sun, and it is very humid too. No signs, especially in English, are marked, so this constant climb can be depressing. You feel it will never end.
Thus at least this part is for experienced, conditioned mountain-hikers only, or those who can survive going slowly and carefully. I wound up at this point going about 500 feet and then resting for about 15 minutes at a stretch.
You should be sure to bring plenty of cold drinking water, and to carry the minimum besides this. I wound up drinking 2 full plastic bottles on the trip up and down, and I could have easily drunk more.
The difficulty may have something to do with foot size, too. Americans are bigger in size the Vietnamese and tend to have bigger feet. This is good for level stretches for the Americans: it enables us to cross more territory more quickly. Going up and down hills is a different story. You need to watch where you are going and make sure that the space in question is strong enough and solid enough to support your feet. Smaller feet make this less of a problem. So Vietnamese would probably have an easier time in this part.
There are two Montagnard shops in the 2-3mile stretch, but these did not seem especially interesting.
The views in this stretch start to become very grand, and somewhat intimidating. You can see over the valley that you can come on from Hue, and this must be at least 20 miles. The wildlife is also very interesting in this stretch. We didn’t see much in the way of larger animals, but there was a bird whose call sounded like the buzzing of an electric razor that cries out in this area. His call changes to a “who-duff-it” and then radio static a little further up. Several beautiful butterflies also keep you company in this stretch.
At about 3.25 miles up, shade starts to cover the road, and this is a major help. Once you get to 3.5 miles, you turn off the road, which continues past. There is a visible but unmarked trail that goes off to your right, and this appears to be the trail to Hamburger Hill. (There are no markings anywhere in this vicinity, either in Vietnamese or in English, so it is impossible to tell.)
The trail is like a regular American forest trail, at least at the start. One for the compensations it has is that it soon leads you to very lush vegetation, which is at least somewhat similar to the brush that was on the Hill when the Americans and the People’s Army of Vietnam (PAVN) fought over it. So this vegetation is rewarding to see, and is an attraction for people with an imagination.
At Fort Bragg, they told us no to grasp onto branches so that people won’t know how many of you are coming as they watch a trail. But on this trail, which is dirt and mud, you have a tendency to ignore this advice, because the mud can get very slick. Here again, the difference in feet size between the Americans and the Vietnamese works to the advantage of Vietnamese. As an American, you can walk on it, but you do have to be careful and have a sense of balance.
The trail leads out into a relatively open area. In this open area, there are some burned stretches of vegetation off to your left as you continue along the trail (you want to take the left fork when the opportunity presents itself). Not much grows in these burned areas, although there are some short plants that look like milkweed. It is difficult to know for sure whether these burned areas came out because of the battle or as part of the Montagnard practice of slash-and-burn agriculture.
There are compensations for nature-lovers in this area, including some beautiful maroon-purple mushrooms that can be seen just off the trail.
Finally, you get over to the edge, where the terrain starts falling off. The view is stupendous; what looks like all of the Laos border-area from the Central Highlands to the DMZ, or Quang Tri Province. Of course this is where the Hamburger Hill fights took place, and it moves you as an American to think you are walking on hallowed ground.
Again, there is nothing to remind you of this, and there should be. Some sort of cable-car system and setting up of a memorial area could make this more popular than it is, and it would be important for Americans to see. But there are virtues to it as it is. You don’t feel manipulated, as you can at the Khe Sanh Combat Base. By making such a hike to get there, you can see what the Americans (and the PAVN) accomplished, and you appreciate it that much more.
There are mosquitoes along the hike up (and down). So malaria could conceivably be a problem, and malaria precautions may be in order. But there has been so much development of the area, so much roadwork in particular, that the mosquito problem really doesn’t seem that bad – if you keep moving, and don’t sit or lie down for hours, you should be OK.
Fluency in Vietnamese is a major advantage for this hike. It’s not just talking with the Montagnard in the two shops along the side of the road. It’s talking to the farm people, to the road crews, and talking in depth to the guide. The open nature of the area, and the lack of police or military officers watching over your shoulder at every step, could mean that you could really get a lot more than even just being at the peak by knowing what you want to see. Some of the remnants of the military preparations of the PAVN may still be there, and in this relatively free environment, if you know where you want to go, it may be possible to see them – a great educational aspect.
