Mui Ne & Ho Ci Minh City, Vietnam, SE Asia

A sleepy beach town in between the bustling seaside resort of Nha Trang and the hectic city of Ho Chi Minh, an ideal spot for us to stop for a few days to totally relax. After the busy schedule in the North of Vietnam we were glad to have reached Mui Ne which has a beach that runs a long a 11km stretch.


Mui Ne was to be our little bit of luxury for 3 nights and so we opted for a room that was situated right on the beach front, we literally had to fall out of our door and land on the soft, warm sand. Water lapping up onto the shore, the sun beating down on you and peace & quiet (no horns beeping!) - the only sound was Vietnamese ladies approaching you and saying "you want massage lady?" - not a bad interuption I would say.

There is more to Mui Ne than just the beach, such as its sand dune landscape and various smaller sites nearby. Mike and I found 2 moto drivers that whizzed us around the town and its surrounds for the day. Stopping off at the local fishing village where hundreds and hundreds of fishing boats dock, White Sand Dunes, Red Sand Dunes, the Red Canyon and finally the Fairy Stream. It was a blazing hot day and so it was a good relief to keep getting on the back of the bikes where our drivers would zip down the road to the next site allowing the breeze to hit our faces. Mui Ne is a lovely place, again another one I wish I could have spent longer but it was time to move on and hit Ho Chi Minh City (HCMC).

Fast paced, just like Hanoi with zillions of motobikes steaming passed you at any one time. As well as the busy streets the locals are out in force wanting to sell you photocopied books, fruit, drinks and anything else you can think of. A quick look at the sights of HCMC and it was then off to visit the Cu Chi Tunnels - a large tunnel network dating back to the Vietnamese war. These people slept, ate and hid from the war above them in small tunnels underground, going as deep as 9 metres. Westerners today can hardly fit into the entrance to one of these tunnels however, a special one was widened so that we could crawl through along 60 metres underground to understand what they had to experience.

We ventured out of HCMC the next day and travelled to the Mekong Delta - The Mekong River originates in Tibet and finally meets the sea in Southern Vietnam. A day trip from Ho Chi Minh took us to the Delta gateway of Mytho and also Ben Tre where we visited some workshops before boarding a small row boat and rowed along some picturesque canals surrounding the Delta. A short stop to listen to some local music and sample some Asian fruits and then it was back to HCMC for the night.