Sa Huynh Beach in the central province of Quang Ngai has clear water, golden sand, and pine trees… It also has a small rocky surprise

The stretch is just 200 meters long, cut off from the rest of the 10-kilometer long Sa Huynh Beach by two rocky ranges.

But Bai Con (Little Beach), which locals call Sa Huynh’s “abandoned child,” has its own unique beauty.

Unlike the other part of Sa Huynh Beach, the waters of Bai Con are always calm and peaceful.

From the nearby Cam Mountain, Bai Con’s golden sands make it look like a yellow silk strip floating on a blue sea.

The two long rocky ranges offer a special adventure for the beachgoers, as navigating them is fun, but not always easy.

From Bai Con, we went west along the rocks, listening to the bird songs from the trees of a nearby mountain. Some of them decided to give us a surprise by darting out of the trees and flying to the rocks we were “walking” on.

After walking for about 20 minutes, we saw the Thien Y A Na Goddess Temple. Thien Y A Na is the Vietnamese name for Po Nagar, the Goddess of the Cham people.

Sa Huynh fishermen visit the temple and pray for a safe trip before heading out to sea.

How to get there

- Bai Con is around 60 kilometers south of the town of Quang Ngai in its namesake province.

- To reach the beach, visit the Sa Huynh Tourism Site in Pho Thanh Commune in Duc Pho District. You can park your vehicles there or around the site. Then ask a xe om (motorbike taxi) to take you to Bai Con (about VND15,000 per person) as there are no parking lots near the beach . You will arrive at Bai Con twenty minutes later.

- You should bring food to enjoy at the beach.

- Apart from Bai Con, you can also explore Hoc Mo Cave in Thanh Duc 2 Hamlet in Pho Thanh Commune and travel around Ma Vuong Hill in the neighboring Pho Khanh Commune to see historic archeological sites.

We moved back and went east. Not long after, we saw smoke rising into the air from people baking oysters. We sheltered behind a large rock to avoid the smoke.

When locals have some free time, they come to the beach with lit torches. They choose some rocks to which numerous oysters cling and bake them. The high temperature force the oysters to open their mouths but their shells are still attached to the rocks.

They are then seasoned with pepper, salt, and lemon juice before the meat is taken out and consumed, accompanied very often by local alcohol. If you are a visitor, chances are you will get invited by the hospitable residents to join them for this special meal.

It is also possible to buy fresh oysters on the way to Bai Con for around VND35,000 (about $2) per kilogram. An oyster soup of rice porridge is a surprisingly enjoyable meal.

Local residents will extend their hospitality if you ask to join them as they take their boats out to sea. Drifting on the gentle waters of Bai Con is a good way to soak in the peaceful atmosphere.

When you are on the boat, it is not a bad idea to carry a pair of binoculars to watch monkeys forage for food on the nearby mountain.

A man in the Central Highlands has transformed his cafe into a Jurassic Park of sorts, displaying more than 300 fossils he"s collected, some of them dating from hundreds of millions of years ago.

Most of the fossils on display at Hoang Thanh"s cafe in the Dak Lak Province town of Buon Ma Thuot are the remains of ferns and pines. Dozens of them are the remains of animals. Thanh collected the artifacts for dozens of years all over the highlands region.

His largest wood fossil, 1.7 meters long and weighing more than two tons, has been identified by scientists as coming from the Jurassic period 175 million years ago, Thanh said.

People can still see the core of the wood and its brown bark.

Another fossil 2.2 meters long is a mixture of minerals from a volcanic eruption. It makes a loud bell-like sound when struck. 

Thanh calls it the “rock bell” and named his café after it: Chuong Da.

He has refused several offers to buy his fossils. They are "too precious" for money, he said.

VinaCapital , Vietnam"s largest fund manager, Friday launched an 18-hole golf course in the central city of Da Nang.

Designed by Australian Greg Norman, the world"s number one ranked golfer in the 1980s and 1990s, "The Dunes" covers 150 hectares of a sand hill in Ngu Hanh Son District’s Hoa Hai Ward, about 10 kilometers from the city"s downtown area.

It is one of the two 18-hole courses belonging to the  Da Nang Golf Club. The other is yet to be put into use.

The club is part of the US$450 million VinaCapital tourism complex built along the Da Nang beach that includes hotels, villas and apartments.

Southern food is sweet and succulent, but it would be a sin to neglect these delicious northern novelties

Vietnam’s three major regions are as different as earth, wind and fire.

The people, landscape, weather and yes, even the food, change in almost every province, but the most pronounced differences come between the northern, central and southern regions.

Southern food is often sweet and filled with fruit while central food is known for being spicy and a bit salty.

But northern dishes are known for their subtlety and are often prepared in a minimalist way without losing out on flavor. Northern chefs concentrate on freshness and focus more on vegetables and pure fish sauce rather than on fruits and sugar like in the south. Spice is added to dishes by diners, not by the cooks.

Ho Chi Minh City has a cornucopia of restaurants from every region and sub-region in Vietnam and the world and many locals frequent northern eateries to get the rawer, simpler flavors of Hanoi and its surrounding areas.

Banh cuon (rolled rice cake) is one of the most popular northern dishes in HCMC.

The meal, which is often taken for breakfast, starts with a thin sheet of freshly cooked rice paper. Though these are normally prepared beforehand in HCMC, in the north they are made fresh to order. The papers are super-thin, sticky, wet, stretchy and chewy.

Skillfully rolled in the silky smooth paper is a delicious combination of ground pork and spices.

The cake is placed on the plate and sprinkled with tiny shrimp, chopped peppermint and coriander for a dash of freshness. The rolled cake is served with fish sauce and two kinds of Vietnamese cold-cuts: cha lua (lean pork paste) and cha que (roasted cinnamon pork paste). Northern banh cuon is served with a straight fish sauce, while southern eateries mix the sauce with sugar. Diners can add red-hot chilies to the sauce if they like.

Other northern foods popular in HCMC are pho ga Ha Noi (Hanoi chicken and rice noodle soup), banh da cua (rice pancake with crab soup), cha muc (squid cake), bun rieu cua (shrimp crab tomato soup with rice noodle) and canh bun (round noodle crab soup).

Many people in HCMC love eating canh bun with rau nhut (water mimosa) and rau muong (water spinach). The green, crispy leaves blend perfectly with the sharp broth and savory crab meat. This soup is also often a breakfast dish.

Other popular northern meals not usually taken for breakfast include canh cua rau day (jute plant crab soup) and ca phao muoi (salted egg-plant), which is served with mam tom (shrimp paste).

To get a taste that brings you back to the old historic streets of the northern capital, try the dishes listed above or go for ga rang muoi (fried chicken with salt), rau lang luoc (boiled sweet potato bud), and ca ro kho tuong ban (stewed anabas with bean paste) at any of these HCMC eateries specializing in northern delicacies:

Goc Ha Noi Restaurant
24/8 Pham Ngoc Thanh Street, Ward 6, District 3

Huong Xua Restaurant
222 Ly Tu Trong Street, District 1

Dang Xua Restaurant
33 Cao Thang Street, District 3

Nga Restaurant
23 Ton Duc Thang Street, District 1

Bun Cha Hoang Tuan Restaurant
T11 Hong Linh Street, Bac Hai Quarter, District 10

Banh Cuon Restaurant
127 Dinh Tien Hoang Street, District 3

Reported by Nguyet Anh

Eight local tour operators recently gathered in Hanoi to officially launch the Responsible Travel Club of Vietnam (RTC), with the goal of promoting tourism that respects the ecosystem, biodiversity and local cultural values.

The members include Footprint Travel, Indochina Travelland, Active Travel, Blue Swimmer Adventures, Freewheelin’ Tours, La Vie Vu Linh, I Travel and Sisters Tours Vietnam.

According to Dang Xuan Son, product manager for Footprint Travel and chairman of the club, RTC aims at working closely with travel firms, NGOs, communities and authorities to promote responsible tourism in Vietnam, design and market tourism products.

“Working together is key to the success of responsible travel, which is about giving something back,” he said.

Currently, RTC is working with SNV Netherlands Development Organization in an on-going responsible travel project in Chieng Yen Commune, Moc Chau District in Son La Province.

For several generations, these markets have kept afloat rural livelihoods, a way of life, and a distinct culture

Can Tho City’s Cai Rang Floating Market is one of the biggest floating markets in the southern region

Floating markets are great tourist draws.

Found only in Southeast Asia, the sight of boats as shops and food stops, the colors of the boats and the produce, ranging from flowers to fruits and vegetables to everything else found in on-land markets, never fail to impress.

However, if you were to tarry a while, the markets have interesting stories to tell, stories of those whose families have been clothed and fed for generations by them, of those who have met their life partners there, and those who cannot imagine their lives without it.

When the first rays of the sun spread their light, thousands of boats of different sizes have already converged along the Tien and Hau rivers in locations that have remained the same for centuries, whether it is Cai Be (Tien Giang Province), Tra On (Vinh Long Province), Phong Dien (Can Tho City) or Thoi Binh (Ca Mau Province).

Not only have the boats gathered, but the markets are already in full swing at dawn. The scene of sellers skillfully throwing and catching goods from one boat to another with the skill of jugglers is one that stands out, but there are many other chaotic scenes where the underlying method is not immediately apparent.

Unlike shops and stalls in ordinary markets, sellers cannot cry out their wares since it is impossible to be heard amidst the noise of running boat engines. So samples of goods are hung on bamboo poles that can be easily seen from afar.

Floating markets draw people from everywhere, and a boat’s initials, like registration plates, identify where it is from. A boat marked “TG” is one that comes from Tien Giang Province, for instance.

Among the big boats are small ones darting in and out selling cooked food and drinks to market-goers and visitors. These swimming canteens skillfully draw alongside boats ordering food and drinks, but there are also occasions when the big boats make a food stop by the side of smaller ones.

One would expect that a floating market is no place for a service industry, but these days, they also offer several “modern” services like installing ringtones and wallpaper for cell phones and cell phone repairs.

Repositories of culture

Floating markets are also living museums of the southern traditional culture that has been fostered by the Mekong Delta’s interlacing waterway systems.

With the advent of several new road networks and bridges over many rivers, as well as the setting up of supermarkets on the mainland, the indispensability of floating markets has been dented somewhat, but the waterways still offer the only route to several rural remote areas in the region.

But many locals still prefer floating markets which have been a part of their daily lives and livelihoods for generations

 
The floating market has helped Van raise her three children and send them to school

Lam, a merchant from Hau Giang Province who drives his boat to Can Tho City’s Cai Rang Floating Market, one of the biggest in the south, says: “My whole clan lives as vendors on floating markets. We own more than ten boats.”

They have an advantage in working together because they can easily exchange information about prices and demand and supply in market, Lam adds.

Di Ba, as she is called by everyone at the Cai Rang Floating Market, is probably the most famous name among food sellers here. For more than thirty years, the woman whose real name is Nguyen Thi Ngoc Van, has taken her small boat to the market, serving bun (noodle) to the locals.

Her family was very poor, Di Ba says. “Like other poor people, my husband and I have to go “down” the river for a living since we don’t have any job or land.”

However, this 60-year-old woman has not only raised her three children well, but also given them a complete education that has changed their lives.

Her children don’t want their mother to continue selling noodles at the floating market at her age, but Di Ba cannot quit. “I am so attached to the market that I feel uncomfortable if I am separated from it.”