The Ocean is Bluer on the Other Side

Chengs at the Canary Resort in Mui Ne
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One of our biggest anticipations for visiting Vietnam was the possibility of enjoying the South China Sea and lounging on idyllic sandy beaches. This mental image was nurtured by our past experience on the east coast of Malaysia which shares the same ocean with Vietnam. So far our actual experience has not met up with our expectations. First of all, most of the towns and cities we have stopped at are actually not on the ocean but located on major rivers some distance away from the ocean itself. This is true of Ho Chi Minh City, Hoi An, Hue, and Hanoi. The one exception was the town of Mui Ne. Here we were able to find a nice beachside resort called the Canary Resort where we spent a week lounging by the pool.

Fishing Boats at Mui Ne
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Well, if not idyllic beaches, then what is the Vietnam coast really like? First one has to realize that with a population of over 80 million living in a country the size of Vietnam, space is at a premium. Almost all of the land is occupied by housing or by farms. Driving between the big cities, one rarely gets a glimpse of uncultivated or unpopulated countryside at all; the roads are lined with buildings or farms all the way along. The waterways from the locals’ perspective are merely extensions of the infrastructure on land – they are transportation routes, working markets, farms (for fish), and places of harvest. The waterways are seen as another resource to earn a living from and not as places of relaxation.

The waterways from the locals’ perspective are merely extensions of the infrastructure on land

Fish being dried in the sun near the beach
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Villages and markets dot the river and ocean fronts. Villagers are often seen rowing their round rattan boats (if you could call them boats, they are actually big baskets) out to the ocean, or hauling in their nets or cleaning them, or putting fish out in the sun to dry. I can’t honestly recall seeing a local lounging about on the beach at all. If there were Asians on the beach, they were from the larger cities such as Ho Chi Minh (locals still refer to it as Saigon) out for a vacation.

Round rattan boats that locals use
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As a result of being a working ocean, the beaches and the water are not always the cleanest; we have seen unidentifiable animal parts lying on the beach, cows traversing the sandy beaches to reach the streams for fresh water and garbage and sand bags strewn on the beaches. Though resorts such as the Canary Resort try to keep their part of the beach clean, one doesn’t need to walk far to see the other aspects of the working waterfront.

Even when there are beach fronts set aside for lounging (such as the beach by Hoi An), the locals see the area as a place of work as numerous vendors aged 12 to 80 are hawking their wares or massage services to the tourists. The Vietnamese are hard working people and use every opportunity to make extra money in order to improve their lot in life. We have met several young people who told us their story of how they work during the day and go to English and/or trade schools later in the afternoon so that they could improve their chances of landing a better paying job. From what we have seen so far, there are no idyllic beaches in Vietnam because for the locals, there is no time to be idle.