The 15-minute experience allows tourists to enter the vast world of Son Doong in a way never offered before.
Son Doong Cave (Photo: Oxalis).
Using 8K visuals and a 180-degree viewing angle, visitors can explore the cave’s immense interior in full detail. The footage is combined with surround sound, motion systems synced to each frame, and effects such as wind, mist, vibration and sunlight to create the most realistic feeling possible.
During the experience, visitors can sense the cave’s cold air, drifting mist and distinctive echoes, from the sound of water droplets falling in the darkness to wind passing through giant stone chambers.
The technology-based journey is expected to be an attractive option for adventure travel enthusiasts who have not yet had the chance to join a real expedition.
Visitors explore Son Doong Cave through 5D VR technology with 8K image quality (Photo: Oxalis).
According to organisers, tickets for the 5D virtual reality Son Doong experience cost VND 500,000 (approximately USD 19) per person. All revenue from the activity will be placed into a local community support fund, continuing the wider meaning of cave exploration.
Alongside the virtual reality experience, the Phong Nha Cave Exploration Information Centre is also displaying documents and images that recreate more than 35 years of underground exploration by cave researchers.
The Phong Nha Cave Exploration Information Centre displays materials and images documenting more than 35 years of underground exploration by cave researchers (Photo: Oxalis).
Ho Van Hoan, deputy director of Quang Tri’s Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism, praised the creation of the unique and vivid space, saying it realistically reflects more than three decades of discovery across the Phong Nha-Ke Bang cave system.
At the same event, provincial tourism leaders expressed gratitude to Howard Limbert, Debora Claire Limbert and members of the British Cave Research Association for their efforts in exploring and promoting Quang Tri’s caves to the world.
During an expedition from March 21 to April 11, the British-Vietnamese team surveyed 29 caves in Quang Tri Province, including 26 newly discovered caves. Many of them were found to be large in scale and of high scientific value within Phong Nha-Ke Bang National Park.
During a survey of Hang En cave inside the national park, the team also discovered five stone axes dating back 6,000 to 8,000 years to the Neolithic period.