<figcaption>Mount Ngoc Linh map</figcaption>

The Ngoc Linh is the high­est point of the Annamese Cordillera (2598 m). Although close to Danang, the Ngoc Linh is a leg­endary and wild mas­sif, one of the remotest in Viet­nam and penin­su­lar Indochi­na. Called the Devil’s Tri­an­gle dur­ing the Viet­nam War, the mas­sif is the object of local superstitions.

On its west­ern slope, the Ngoc Linh dom­i­nates the N14 road (the Hô Chi Minh road) and the Laot­ian bor­der. To the north, it extends towards the foothills of its coun­ter­part, the Ataouat (2500 m), the sec­ond-high­est point of the Annamese Cordillera. To the east, it over­looks the Pacif­ic Ocean and the coastal plains of Quang Ngai province, while to the south lie the Dak To Val­ley and the north­ern lim­its of the cen­tral high­lands, north of Kontum.

<img alt="" src="https://www.secretindochina.com/upload-images/programmes/mount-ngoc-linh/NGOC-LINH-EST-11-1607919361.jpg" />
<figcaption>East side of Ngoc Linh</figcaption>

The Ngoc Linh range forms an impos­ing mass, with tight gran­ite peaks run­ning north to south and the cen­ter form­ing a kind of horse­shoe around a cen­tral val­ley cut by the Dak Mek Riv­er. The north­ern slopes of the Ngoc Linh stretch toward the town of Kham Duc and the Ngoc Gle Glang (1865 m), a bloat­ed, wood-cov­ered moun­tain. Fur­ther south, the mas­sif ris­es abrupt­ly, appear­ing as a black wall formed by a set of peaks dom­i­nat­ing the Dak Mek gorges, notably the Ngoc Pue Tok (1050 m), the Ngoc Brisse (1433 m), the Ngoc Peu­rao (1683 m) and the Ngoc Mele (1249 m).

South of this black wall, the cen­tral val­ley of Ngoc Linh opens into a val­ley dom­i­nat­ed by two high ridges with a set of impos­ing misty peaks, includ­ing, to the east, the high­est point: the Ngoc Linh (2598 m), neigh­bor­ing Mount Plésé Toum (2576 m), and Mount Kong Tan (2018 m). The west­ern ridge is over­looked by Mount Ngoc Gleyang. Towards the east, Ngoc Linh offers dra­mat­ic views of high, misty slopes cov­ered by for­est, with foamy waters flow­ing down from cataracts to the Dak Di Riv­er. The south­ern part of the cen­tral val­ley is closed off by a nar­row pass lead­ing to the massif’s south­ern­most val­ley, with a long ridge­line and the dark mass of mount Ngoc Yang (2,378 meters). To the west, the Ngoc Linh falls toward the val­ley of the Dak Pek and Dak Poko rivers.

<img alt="Mount Ngoc Linh" src="https://www.secretindochina.com/upload-images/programmes/mount-ngoc-linh/NGOC%20LINH%20VIETNAM%2088.JPG-1607919449.jpg" />
<figcaption>Mount Ngoc Linh</figcaption>

The com­plex orog­ra­phy of the Ngoc Linh pro­duces many wind­ing streams that strug­gle to find their way, flow­ing and rum­bling on peb­ble and blunt rock beds through tor­tu­ous, steeply-cut small val­leys barred by falls and rapids. Dur­ing heavy mon­soons, the massif’s count­less springs turn into roar­ing water­falls. One of its most note­wor­thy rivers is the Dak Mek (and its trib­u­taries the Dak Mea, Dak Rosé, Dak Jol and Dak Duat), which becomes the Dak Mi fur­ther upstream and feeds the Song Cai, whose waters join the Pacif­ic at Hoi An. Oth­ers include the Dak Di, which feeds the Song Tranh and also flows towards Hoi An; and the Dak Poko, which runs towards Kon­tum, Pleiku, and Cam­bo­dia, where it forms the Xe San togeth­er with oth­er Daks; and the Sekong, which flows to the Mekong at the lev­el of Stung Treng.

<img alt="View over Mount Ngoc Linh" src="https://www.secretindochina.com/upload-images/programmes/mount-ngoc-linh/NGOC%20LINH%20VIETNAM%2055.JPG-1607919521.jpg" />
<figcaption>View over Mount Ngoc Linh</figcaption>

The Ngoc Linh is clas­si­fied as a nature reserve. Bio­log­i­cal stud­ies con­duct­ed in the region by sev­er­al insti­tu­tions – includ­ing the Amer­i­can Muse­um of Nat­ur­al His­to­ry, the Mis­souri Botan­i­cal Gar­den, and the Insti­tute of Eco­log­i­cal and Bio­log­i­cal Resources of Viet­nam – have iden­ti­fied 385 species of plants, 50 species of mam­mals, 171 vari­eties of birds, 15 species of rep­tiles, and 25 amphib­ians. Among the most notable are the munt­jac (Munti­a­cus truong­so­nen­sis) and the gold­en-winged thrush (Gar­ru­lax ngoclinhensis).

The Ngoc Linh is pop­u­lat­ed by the Sedang (Xo Dang), a pro­to-Indochi­nese indige­nous group from the Aus­tro-Asian and North-Bah­nar­ic lan­guage fam­i­ly that has exist­ed in the region since ancient times. Their num­bers are declin­ing; in 1975 there were 400,000 Sedang, and now there are only 127,148. They are divid­ed into sub-groups includ­ing the Hdang, Kmrang, To Dra, Ca Dong, Mon­am, Chau, Ta Tre and Halang. Sedang ter­ri­to­ry bor­ders the land of the Katu, Jeh and Cua to the north, and the land of Bah­nar, Ron­gao, Hadrong and Bah­nan to the south.

To the west, it extends towards Laos and the regions of the Ren­gao, Halang, Alak, and to the east the lands of the Kat­ua, Kay­ong, Hre, Todrah and Monom. In old­en times, Sedang ter­ri­to­ry includ­ed the cen­ters of Cham­pa, includ­ing My Son and the coastal plains pop­u­lat­ed by Khins.

<figcaption>Sedang peo­ple</figcaption>

Tra­di­tion­al­ly the Sedang are nomadic and prac­tice slash-and-burn agri­cul­ture, now pro­hib­it­ed and replaced by irri­gat­ed rice cul­ti­va­tion – a tech­nique that can be seen on the sump­tu­ous, rice-ter­raced slopes of the Ngoc Linh. The Sedang vil­lages of the Ngoc Linh are estab­lished in the cen­tral val­ley or mid-slope on dif­fer­ent areas of the mas­sif, under the edge of the great summit-forest.

The main com­mu­ni­ties are Dak Nai, Mac Lung, Dak Rang and Tra Linh. The vil­lages are often cir­cu­lar in shape, with com­mu­nal hous­es marked by slop­ing roofs. The Sedang hous­es look tiny, like hob­bit hous­es, with a low, almost round door that leads to the smoky, dark main room. They typ­i­cal­ly do not have win­dows, except for a black hole in the roof for smoke to escape and small alcoves that appear in the dark. The paths lead­ing from the vil­lages to the edge of the for­est are often pro­tect­ed by fright­en­ing totem poles, with pearl eyes and cov­ered by shiny moss.

<img alt="Sedang totem" src="https://www.secretindochina.com/upload-images/programmes/mount-ngoc-linh/SEDANG-TOTEM-VIETNAM-70-1607920421.jpg" />
<figcaption>Sedang totem</figcaption>

The Sedang are orig­i­nal­ly ani­mist and have a par­tic­u­lar affin­i­ty to astron­o­my and celes­tial objects, espe­cial­ly the stars, because the high alti­tude of their ter­ri­to­ry allows fair­ly accu­rate obser­va­tions. Some cir­cum­po­lar stars are asso­ci­at­ed with sow­ing and har­vest­ing cycles, for exam­ple the North Star and the Holong Kon­long (lit­er­al­ly the upstream star). The Milky Way is named Holong Nheng (the mir­ror stars or glass stars). Shoot­ing stars and mete­ors are called Holong Eak (a defe­cat­ing star), and the Tek­tites (Indo­chinites) or mete­orites some­times found in the south of the Sedang coun­try towards Kon­tum are there­fore approached with the utmost cau­tion since they are con­sid­ered as fae­ces of the stars.

The comets, called Kia Xeang (ghost-spir­it), are traces left by the wake of ghosts or lizards pro­pelling them­selves into the cos­mos, their sight herald­ing dis­ease. Some very bright stars are called Holong Nheang, includ­ing Venus, the Holong Ga (the dawn star). The local­ly des­ig­nat­ed Pleiades of Todrong Chu (pig bas­ket) are used as a cal­en­dar to define the times of sow­ing and har­vest­ing. The stel­lar clus­ter of the Hyades (the con­stel­la­tion of the bull) is des­ig­nat­ed Toni­am (the blacksmith’s forge); Ori­on is Ta (the spear trap, its three stars being spear-shaped); Betel­geuse, a red super­giant in Orion’s con­stel­la­tion, is Chiu (the bark­ing deer); and the South­ern Cross is prob­a­bly Khia (the shield).

<img alt="Sedang sacrificial pole" src="https://www.secretindochina.com/upload-images/programmes/mount-ngoc-linh/NGOC-LINH-11-1607919730.jpg" />
<figcaption>Sedang sac­ri­fi­cial pole</figcaption>

The Sedang sac­ri­fi­cial poles, the Loang Kang Ja Pia (lit­er­al­ly the sac­ri­fice totem of grand­moth­er Pia, as Pia or Apia is a Sedang god­dess, either ele­phant, human or flower), rep­re­sent the con­stel­la­tion of Scor­pio. The moon has sev­er­al names accord­ing to its phas­es – hang­ing moon, big moon, medi­um moon, moon with a frog’s bel­ly. The appear­ance of Kau Ka Khe (the Kau fish that eats the moon), an eclipse, is con­sid­ered a bad omen. The sun des­ig­nates the hours of the day: the out­go­ing sun, the warm, the falling, and the flood­ed (the set­ting). An eclipse is called Kdpe Ka Hai (the mil­li­pede eats the sun, a drag­on among the Chi­nese), and dur­ing the phe­nom­e­non, the vil­lagers sus­pend their field­work to gath­er, shout, scream and bang on gongs and drums to help the sun in its fight.

In the com­plex Sedang approach to astron­o­my, one can imag­ine their vision of moun­tains, forests and rivers: chil­dren of the stars and home to a mul­ti­tude of genius­es, spir­its and oth­er fright­en­ing crea­tures. Their fears are expressed in the myths and sto­ries sur­round­ing Mount Ngoc Linh, the cen­tral and high­est point of Sedang coun­try. Dur­ing the Viet­nam War, the U.S. Air Force pilots called Ngoc Linh the Devil’s Tri­an­gle because all kinds of air­craft were shot down there. Its cen­ter was a maquis area of the North Viet­namese Army, and its sur­round­ings the scene of many bat­tles and for­mer U.S. spe­cial bases, includ­ing Mang Buk and Dak To to the south and the spe­cial forces’ camps of Ha Thanh and Gia Vuc to the southeast.

Offi­cial­ly, the sum­mit of the Ngoc Linh has nev­er been con­quered. Locals and var­i­ous expe­di­tions report pass­ing through the gin­ger plan­ta­tions and then being pushed back by an invis­i­ble force. Accord­ing to a local offi­cial, Mr. A Dieu, the cam­eras, elec­tron­ic binoc­u­lars or GPS stop work­ing above a cer­tain alti­tude, and heli­copters try­ing to fly over the sum­mit are caught in tur­bu­lence (or a mys­te­ri­ous pow­er) and are forced to re-route. In 2011, a Russ­ian expe­di­tion told of strange things hap­pen­ing when its mem­bers went beyond the foothills of the sum­mit for­est: the sky dark­ened, they were hit by a tor­na­do, and trees fell, block­ing the way. The next day the expe­di­tion was lost and turned back. As soon as they reached the cen­tral val­ley, the weath­er became clement again. The Ngoc Reo, a counter-val­ley near the cen­tral val­ley, is the site of visu­al phe­nom­e­na, with tales of the moun­tains mov­ing and retreat­ing. Adding to the mys­tery, the Ngoc Linh would be used for strate­gic purposes.

With­in the frame­work of the research of the Last Fron­tiers, Secret Indochi­na stud­ies the Ngoc Linh and orga­nizes research there, espe­cial­ly around its mar­itime slopes that have been closed since 1975.

<img alt="" src="https://www.secretindochina.com/upload-images/programmes/mount-ngoc-linh/2018%20-%20Sedang%20totem%20-%20resized-1607920517.jpg" />