Your 2 days in Halong Bay aboard the Indochina sail arranged by Vietnamstay. What was the name of your boat that you stayed on. Sounded so wonderful. Was it the Indochina as I can't find that name of the boat on the web site. Thank you in advance and am sure enjoying reading of your trip. KG

Have been following along here lurking . . . really enjoying reading all the details of your trip thus far. Taking notes because I hope to do the same some day.

Many thanks again Crellston for your useful advice. We didn't make it to Ba Be lake this time but will put it on the top agenda of our next visit :)

Goldeyk: We were booked aboard the Indochina Sail 3 - the newest of the fleet, after the rec of the regular posters here and would say that they were all spot on.

Still trying to wrap up the final part of this report...

Cheers

Still waiting on the wrap up!!!

So we departed the hustle and bustle of the city in search of sand, sun and some chillaxing in Mui Ne. It’s a retreat city for many of the dwellers to come and unwind on a weekend or holiday basis, when we arrived however it wasn’t that crowded and the place was a real chillout place.

After checking into our resort, the rest of our first day was spent on the beach and through the town checking everything out. We ended up stumbling upon a massage and beauty parlor that were doing treatments incredibly cheap.

Mui Ne had a beautiful white sand beach of 6km and the wind was amazing which meant that the place was packed with wind surfers, kite surfers…going a heck of a speed over the waves! Mui Ne is an up and coming style holiday area too so there are really chilled resorts along the coast which anyone can go into. We ended up staying here for about 3 days to get some wind swept R&R and managed to learn some Vietnamese from the lady at the beach bar.

One of the other things we discovered to do in the local area was check out the sand dunes because it’s not all beach here at Mui Ne – the town is famous for their incredible red and white sand dunes! We were taken in a Jeep to explore them and started off by visiting the fishing village which was amazing to see the small round boats that the Vietnamese use to fish for a daily living.

We then went to see the Fairy Stream which is basically a small canyon where you can walk up the river and see the white and red sand cliffs and walk in the warm water.

The formations that the sand made were pretty cool to say the least and it was interesting also to see the rival gangs of children that fight to take tourists. There was also a lady cleaning banana leaves in the water which was cool to see.

From there we went to something called Red Canyon, then we headed to the infamous white sand dunes which were just incredible. The wife and I managed to climb to the peak, then attempted to sand surf down which basically meant you moved a bit of a way and ate a gallon of sand! It was fun though.

Finally on the way back we stopped to see the contrasting Red Sand Dunes of the area. To end we then ended up watching a beautiful sunset with a beer and a cup of tea on the beach!

Well, that’s it. A fantastic end to a very chilled holiday in Vietnam. Would definitely come back in a heartbeat!

Thanks again for the fabulous trip report. I enjoyed reading it. How did you get to Mui Ne and how far is it from Saigon? Sounds like fun!

Fantastic!! Thanks for sharing!

loved the report....look forward to my arrival there in november

Hello,

Thanks all for your nice words. We took the 6.45am train in Saigon and arrived at the station in Phan Thiet at noon (it took about 5 hrs as I recall). We were then picked up and taken to the beach. So totally it was more than 200km from Saigon. To my knowledge, you can go by public bus as well.

Cheers

Thanks again for taking your time wrapping up such a great report. Mui Ne sounds amazing. From what I've read, you seemed to skip Nha Trang?

Yes - thanks so much for the great report. I enjoyed reading it.

JM - We skipped Nha Trang after reading negative reports stating that it's a very touristy town and pickpockets are notorious over there. Have no way to compare it to Mui Ne (which we much enjoyed).

Regards

Thanks for the feedback. We're including Nha Trang on our upcoming trip in Vietnam as recommended by many people out here. Will read up more and hopefully we'll have a good time. Cheers.

Thank you so much for a nice read! I'm very interested in Vietnam and glad you'd a great trip.

Cheers

Thanks for your report of your trip. I have been to Vietnam 3 times-the first with car and driver which I am happy I did. Once having been there it was not that hard to travel from North to South. The Mekong is really an amazing place to see all the boats and the people with their wares. Did not to go Nha Trang-rather to Dalat which not many tourist don't visit-also to the Du Moh tunnels where people lived during the war with US. Vietnam is an amazing country.
Thanks for sharing your experience.

You're welcome. I agree that Vietnam is an amazing country and it's easy enough to do it yourself. Heard a lot about Da Lat but didn't make our way there. How long did you stay there?

Thank you for your excellent report!

Yes, thank you! I just found this report and enjoyed reading every word. It makes me want to return to Vietnam!

scomars,
we went to many of the same places and it was fun reading your versions. You're brave staying in a homestay in the Mekong....I fret too much about the food safety.

Great report -- very helpful for our trip this winter.