Compass Travel Vietnam
The girl set a record to go to Son Doong – the largest cave in the world 120 times completely… for free
A tour of Son Doong costs 3,000 USD, if you want to set foot in this famous cave 120 times, you will have to spend 360,000 USD, equivalent to about 9 billion VND.
There is a girl born in 1990 who has set foot in Son Doong 120 times without spending any money. She is a tour guide of the Oxalis travel company, the exclusive unit of the Son Doong expedition tour in Phong Nha, Quang Binh.
H’Anetta’s mother is an Ede in Buon Ma Thuot, and her father is a Jrai in Gia Lai. They met while going to school in Nha Trang, then came back to live in Gia Lai. Because of the matriarchy, H’Anetta follows her mother’s last name.
Born in 1990, after graduating from the English language department at Hue University, she joined Oxalis in 2014 while studying a master’s course in theory and methods of teaching English.
H’Anetta – tour guide of Oxalis . travel agency
One of the reasons why Anetta then turned to become a tour guide was her love for nature, mountains and forests.
With a small build and big eyes, if she didn’t smile, Anetta would look quite cold. But when it comes to Son Doong or the work she is doing, the whole woman exudes a source of energy, full of blood, but also very gentle.
Anetta performs the job of a guide. Photo: Character Fb
Anetta tells about her journey to become a tour guide in Son Doong. After joining Oxalis for about 3 months, once when watching Ryan Deboodt’s introductory video about Son Doong, she suddenly formed in her mind the thought, I will have to be the guide of this tour. Then Anetta strives to lead Son Doong.
In January 2015, H’Anetta entered Son Doong for the first time, on that tour she went with experienced guides to learn, to know the route and what to do on the tour, roughly speaking. is to go “apprenticeship”.
Son Doong Cave is very wide, has many different sections and is named by experts. Anetta said, she was most impressed during her first Son Doong expedition when she looked at the famous Hand of Dog. Seeing the giant stalagmite with her own eyes at that time, her feeling was broken. Anetta asked everyone’s permission, quietly stepped back and burst into tears.
” It’s so surreal, I finally set foot in Son Doong. I’ve reached my dream, ” said H’Anetta.
“Hand of the dog” is a massive natural stalactite block in Son Doong cave, looking from afar towards the Ho Sut 1 area, its silhouette can be seen appearing majestically. Honestly, however, Anetta thinks it resembles a witch on a broomstick.
It turns out that behind it is an interesting story about the birth of the name Hand of dog. Not being experts when surveying Son Doong, each time entering the cave will mark, name important points and draw a map. That point was originally called the Hand of God. But then due to unknown radio communication, there was a deviation, leading to a pun into Hand of Dog.
Source: Oxalis
Anetta said, when you don’t like it, you won’t see the beauty. As for her, because she liked it, when asked what she felt was the hardest or most difficult thing about this job, she shook her head.
During the conversation, every inch of the scenery of Phong Nha Ke Bang appeared through Anetta’s story, beautiful and peaceful.
H’Anetta passionately told about the Son River in the March weather, in the cold of the cold weather of Ban, the water was blue and calm like a soft silk. The floating clouds drifted along the Ke Bang mountain range. The motorboats rattled, bringing visitors into Phong Nha cave, leaving white streaks of water.
Continuously from 2015 to 2021, with 120 visits to Son Doong, Anetta still constantly “vibrates” with this place.
“ Son Doong is beautiful every time we meet. It changes from day to day, to different passages. Sometimes the air is transparent in one part, and the next part is blurred with tiny droplets of dew, ” Anetta said.
There will be people who wonder, repeating such a job for a long time, will she ever get bored? After all, it’s just mountains, forests, trees, caves, stalactites,…
” Son Doong can’t be bored ” Anetta firmly affirmed ” The beauty of Son Doong is that no matter how many times you go, it still feels like the first impression, does not fade at all. Like first love, the feeling still intact as at the beginning ” H’Anetta laughed.
H’Anetta and visitors. Photo: Character Fb
In terms of staff size as well as the number of annual visitors, Oxalis is the largest adventure travel company in Southeast Asia. They follow the path of making regenerative tourism (some call it regenerative tourism), whereby the goal of tourism exploitation is to make the destination better after each trip.
This has enabled the staff at Oxalis, including Anetta, to build a great ideology in protecting and preserving the environment and natural resources.
” In the past, there were things that I myself did not pay attention to about the environment. After a year of working at Oxalis, when I came home to see my father smoking or littering, I felt uncomfortable, ” Anetta said.
This year, Anetta moved to the marketing department of Oxalis company. When asked how long she will stick with this job, Anetta answered frankly that she has not thought about when she will quit. Currently, she is still working and dedicating with passion.
“Passion is a rather abstract thing and many people say passion is not the deciding factor. But for myself, I have an undying passion for adventure tourism here. Passion accounts for 60% of my life. – 70%. I think that when I don’t like it, I won’t have the motivation to do it, and the work I do will be sloppy and superficial .
In fact, every job needs a new passion for the best results. But perhaps for those who work in the service industry, it is adventure tourism, when the terrain and working conditions are quite special, strenuous and somewhat dangerous, if not really passionate, it is difficult to have such a long-term relationship.
120 visits to Son Doong, for most people, is an impressive number. But for her master with nearly ten years as an adventure tour guide, that’s all youth. It is a journey of love and passion for the mountains and forests of Phong Nha Ke Bang.
The girl set a record to go to Son Doong – the largest cave in the world 120 times completely… for free
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