After the hustle and bustle and insanity that is Ho Chi Minh City, we decided we would do as the locals do and escape to the nearest beach for a couple days. This happens to be in the town of Vung Tao, located on the tip of a peninsula jutting out where the Saigon River meets the South China Sea. If HCMC is the New York of Vietnam, then Vung Tao is probably equivalent to Long Island. It's where the city folk go for their short beach weekends or even day trips. Granted, it's not as nice of a beach as those a little further up the coast (or so we're told) but it's still got sand and surf and ocean views! French colonists began coming here in 1890 and the French still know it as Cap St. Jacques.
The easiest and fastest way to get to Vung Tao is by hydrofoil boats from the ferry dock in HCM. It takes roughly an hour and 20 minutes of chugging down the Saigon River. The boats are air-conditioned with comfy seats. You can also take a cheaper 3 hour bus ride, but that didn't sound nearly as fun, so we took the boat! We went past some mangrove forests, but unfortunately the speed and smallish windows don't make for great picture/video ops. We got into Vung Tao around 4:30pm, right in the middle of a massive downpour. We hadn't arranged a hotel yet so we had to just jump in one of the millions of cabs (they swarm to you when they see foreigners get off the boats) and we had him take us to the area known as Back Beach, where the actual good sandy beach is located. We grabbed a hotel name/address from our guidebook and spent our 1st night there. It was definitely a "budget" hotel compared to what we stayed in in HCM. (Read: hot, shabby, dirty, and Sarah had her 1st encounter with a GIANT bug hiding in the garbage can). But it did the trick. We stayed the next night in a much nicer, bug-free place with ocean views for about $5 more.
View of Back Beach from our hotel room
Vung Tao is a pretty large city in its own right, but most tourists stick along the coastline, which winds around several small "mountains" that split the town up into different little sections. Back Beach, where we stayed, is located on one side of Small Mountain. Front Beach, where the ferry dock and main stretch of touristy bars, restaurants and hotels are located isn't really a beach at all, and it's tucked in between Small Mountain and Big Mountain. Following the coastline around Big Mountain takes you to a third area known as Mulberry Beach where most of the fanciest 5-star resorts are located. It is clear that this is a town that is quickly developing as more and more people have the money to escape out to the beach. It is still relatively unknown to Western tourists apparently, but by the look of all the new resorts being constructed that's probably going to change soon. It helped that we are here during the low/rainy season and luckily it only rains in the afternoon and then clears up again for the evening.
View from Front Beach of fishing boats in front of Big Mountain
Besides the beaches, Vung Tao is known as the "Rio de Vietnam" because of the giant Jesus statue located on the top of Small Mountain that looks down over the coast. The Vietnamese claim this is the highest Jesus statue in the world (taller than the Rio one by 6 meters). We're not sure this is true, but we decided we were too lazy to climb all the way up to find out.
Giant Jesus on top of Small Mountain
After running around HCM for a week, this was our chance to laze around a bit, eat some amazing fresh seafood, and drink cheap Vietnamese beer. We walked from beach to beach rather than taking cabs everywhere, so over the course of the 2 days we spent here we probably still walked about 9 miles. But our time here definitely helped- we've relaxed a bit and it's finally starting to feel like we're on a vacation!
Food highlights included eating freshly cooked corn on the beach at night in the rain, having a woman on the street fry up a live octopus for our dinner, caving in after a week of solely Vietnamese food to have an authentic wood-fired pizza at an Italian restaurant (it was amazing), and best of all, eating our fill of fresh shrimp and oysters at a restaurant on the water while the waves from high-tide crashed right up against the wall where we sat. Overall Vung Tao is a great little escape and we'd recommend it!
Tons of fresh seafood options with our unlucky octopus on the far left
Caught-that-morning seafood lunch with a view
