Teacher Trekker

Mui Ne is a coastal beach town approximately four hours from Ho Chi Minh City in the southeastern region of Vietnam. I found the town to be like most other beach towns I’ve traveled to around the world. There were many resorts, hotels, restaurants, bars and cafes. In typical Vietnam fashion, there were also more massage parlors and travel agencies than seems necessary. Most of this is concentrated along Nguyen Dinh Chieu Street, the main road that travels through the town. Due to the strong sea breezes, many tourists spend the time kitesurfing and windsurfing. Others spend time at the beach relaxing or taking day trips in the surrounding area. I also noticed something unusual: there were more signs in Cyrillic than in English, because it seems the town is a major destination for Russian tourists. Furthermore, many of the businesses are actually also owned and operated by Russian expats.

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Getting a Hotel Room

Once I arrived in Mui Ne, I was quickly welcomed to the beach town by almost a half a dozen local women, who were all trying to convince we to stay at the particular hotel or beach resort in which they worked. Okay, let’s be honest, I wasn’t really welcomed. Rather, I was pulled in a hundred different directions as each woman tried to get me and every other passenger who just exited the bus to follow them to the hotel they work at so we would check in there, thus earning them commission for our stay. I recommend that you negotiate with everyone until you find a location and price that satisfies you, but more on that in an upcoming posting.

Since it was not peak travel season while I was in Mui Ne, there were rooms at hotels and resorts everywhere. I did find a few rooms that cost just over $10, but the majority of the resorts with off beach bungalows ranged from $25 to $40 a night. When one girl in the street heard me say that $30 was way too much for a room, she offered to show me a room at the hotel in which she worked. After a brief discussion with the manager, I decided to stay at the Xin Chao Hotel. The cost was $15 a night for a non-smoking room with air conditioning and cabinets that could lock. There was a safe downstairs where you could store more valuable items. The hotel earned a high rating and had good reviews for which they received a 2014 Trip Advisor award. There were security cameras all over the grounds, and they had a security guard on duty from 10 p.m. to 6 a.m.. Considering my options, I decided to stay there. It was the best deal I found over the course of an hour, and I didn’t want to get any further away from the center of town. Based on price, security and the friendly Dutch manager who moved into town 5 years ago and never looked back, I felt comfortable at this location. My only complaint about the hotel is that during the night the air conditioning and most of the other power in the hotel went out a few times only to be turned back on minutes later. This occurred 3 or 4 times over the course of the night. Apparently, there was something wrong with the entire grid network, because the power went out in a number of hotels along the block. This is more of a Vietnamese infrastructure issue than a problem with the specific hotel.

After securing my room, I went to grab a quick meal and book some tours. Once again it was time to negotiate with the countless local travel agencies. It was lunchtime and a number of them were closed or unoccupied. Their loss! After shopping around, it looked like everyone was very firm on their prices until I decided to try and create my own package deals with them. I managed to work with one agent who was willing to make a few deals for me if I purchased all my tours and my transport with him.

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Tour Options & Suggestions

The most popular tour was a half day tour that cost $10, which went to the Red Sand Dunes, White Sand Dunes, Fishing Village and Fairy Stream. A private jeep or motorbike tour was quoted at around $20. Both prices do not include the cost of any required entry fees or activities. For those taking the morning tour, you would see the White Sand Dunes at sunrise, while those touring in the afternoon would see the Red Sand Dudes at sunset. If you only wanted to go to one of the dunes, the single ride would cost $6 per location. Personally, I wanted to see both the sunrise and sunset. This is where negotiating for my package deal came into play. I willingly paid for the half day tour and the $7 bus ride to Dalat the following day for a total of $17. The agent then waved the fee for a motorbike ride to the Red Sand Dunes for sunset if I paid for his gas, which worked out to be just under $1. So for $18 I got a half day tour, a round trip ride to and from the Red Sand Dunes for sunset (while he waited for me for at least an hour) and my ticket to my next city. Without a discount this should have cost a total of $23. Overall that was a $5 savings, and in Vietnam that pays for lunch and dinner! I had no complaints in terms of negotiations. If you are riding your own motorcycle or rent a motorbike, you should be able to drive to all of these locations yourself and only need to pay a few small entry fees along the way. Again compare the cost of the motorbike rental to the tour cost and make your own judgments accordingly.

To be quite honest, I am not a beach person, but I am an ocean person. I really can’t stand sand getting everywhere, but I could swim in the ocean for hours on end. I didn’t really travel to Mui Ne to sit on the beach all day, which is in stark comparison to the agendas of the vast majority of Russian tourists in the area that I met. I was shocked to meet people who were in town for two weeks with no desire to travel and explore anywhere else in the country, but to each his own. I did try to go to the beach two times, and both times I was told by some sort of beach security that I could not go to the beach because it was high tide. What I did see of the beach was not the typical tropical beach destinations that Asia is so well known for. There was not crystal clear blue green water. There were no white sand lining the beach. Due to this I had little interest in staying and attempting to learn how to kitesurf or windsurf. Overall, I was not impressed and wasn’t completely heartbroken that I was not able to cool off in the ocean for a short while.

For anyone not interested in staying in Mui Ne for an extended period of time, and a desire to get in and get out quickly, I suggest trying to follow an extremely compressed itinerary to maximize your time while in the beach town. Following one of these plans will allow you to get in and out of Mui Ne in a day unless you want to extend your stay. Personally, I managed to get everything done that I wanted to (with one minor exception) in a single day. I never made it to the local temple for some photos.

First, you need to get transportation to the beach town. If you are traveling north, get the early morning bus in HCMC to get you to Mui Ne by around noon. If you are traveling south get the early morning bus from Dalat to get you in town by roughly the same time. If you are traveling from Nha Trang, I believe that there is an overnight sleeper that would be your best option, as the ride is around 8 hours. I cannot give you any more detailed information regarding the Mui Ne to Nha Trang route, because I did not follow that path. If you use any of these options, you will arrive in town between the morning and lunchtime. Regardless of when you arrive in town, you will be much too late for the early morning tour and probably will just miss the afternoon tours. This is just the reality of the bus schedules and the tour schedules. They do not allow for synergy in this situation. Timing is always a funny thing when you are traveling, especially in Vietnam. At times it will feel like everything is running contradictory to normal time tables or scheduling for the purpose of efficiency and time management.

Option # 1 – If somehow you show up before noon you may get lucky, but don’t count on it. If you could get on an afternoon tour right away, I would recommend you do that. You will view all four locations and be able to view the Red Sand Dunes for sunset. Then visit the White Sand Dunes independently the following morning for the sunrise. You could be finished so early that you could even go back to your hotel, check out and catch a morning bus out of town.

Option # 2 – If you show up after noon then follow my itinerary below.

Option # 3 – Do not take any of the half day tours. Visit the Red Sand Dunes for sunset and the White Sand Dunes for sunrise and skip the other less significant stops on the tour.

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My Mui Ne Itinerary – Sunset & Nightlife

For anyone arriving in town following the departure of the afternoon tours, I would recommend that you first find a hotel, check in and eat in whatever order best suits your needs. Personally, I did minimal research in hotels throughout my trip, so whenever I arrived into a new town I would first grab a bite to eat, connect to wifi and find a hotel in the area. After you have a bed to sleep in and a full belly, go talk to the tour agents and negotiate your tours. Again, I recommend trying the package deal I outlined above that scored me a discount. You could even go to the beach for an hour or so in the afternoon. About an hour before sunset, I would recommend taking transport to
the Red Sand Dunes for sunset. There are some vendors at the base of the dunes that sell food and beverages. Local transport stays there waiting for tourists who need to pick up their ride, collect their rented motorbike or find a ride back into town. My tour agent drove me, waited for me and drove me back to my hotel. Perhaps you can get the same deal I did. Unfortunately, I cannot find the name of the agency, so I can’t point you to an exact location.

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After watching sunset, go back to the hotel and wash all the sand off before you head out for the evening. I met some French travelers at the dunes who I rode the bus with into town. We met for drinks and dinner. We ate at one of the many waterfront restaurants that had fresh seafood from the day’s catch in tanks and water filtered buckets on display. The meal was prepared quickly, tasted good despite the fact that they used Raman noodles and not fresh noodles, and was very inexpensive. I believe the 5 of us ate, they each had a beer and I had a coffee all for under $15. There is always value when eating out in Vietnam at night.

Following dinner we stopped at a few local watering holes. We first stopped at Joe’s Cafe to relax and watch a guitarist sing classic rock and pop hits from America. They have many specials that change throughout the day, so if you are in town, check their specials when you walk by the bar and take note of it for later. Afterwards, we went to Dragon Bar, which was what in Vietnam I would call a club. It was a Friday night and the town felt empty. There were people, but just not the amount of people that I would have expected to see on a weekend in a beach town during the summer. Everything closed shortly after midnight, so it wasn’t by any means that late. I said goodnight to my French friends as they were traveling south and I was traveling north, and we parted ways. These were both nice locations, and with a larger crowd would have been an even better time. (Photos upon request.)

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After only a few short hours of sleep, my alarm clock woke me just prior to 5 a.m. to get ready for the morning half-day tour. I waited outside my hotel for my transport. I was the first of four to be picked up in our military style jeep. Joining me that morning were all travelers around my age exploring Vietnam with similar stories to my own. We actually had an interesting day together having some pretty heavy discussions about animal conservation, eco footprints, and globalization as it applies to backpacking, tourism and travel across Asia. During our morning tour we stopped first at the White Sand Dunes to watch the sunrise. It was a spectacular view only to be outdone by the sunset the previous night. They are some of my favorite photographs of the natural landscape I took during my time in Vietnam. None of us chose to rent the quads to ride on the dunes. The price was much too expensive for all of our tastes. We chose to simply walk, wander and watch while we stayed there for the hour.

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Afterwards, we were driven to the Red Sand Dunes. We stayed there for just under an hour. Many people were riding down the dunes on large plastic boards or sheets that is basically sledding on sand instead of snow. Now, since it was daytime, there were women who walked the dunes selling food to tourists. I already explored the dunes the previous night, so I just sat around observed people and took in the beauty of the local scenery. At the base of the dunes we grabbed something to drink before heading over to the Fishing Village.

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I was not impressed with this part of the tour at all. It was downright dirty, to put it simply. The level of sanitation was quite low, and it was not fishing as I would define it. It looked like everything was caught in a huge net and women would sort through the masses of seafood on the sand after the catch was brought to them. There really wasn’t much to see. I did take some photos, and the scene did paint a vivid picture of the reality of the lives of many of the locals in the area.

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Following our short stay, we were dropped off at the Fairy Stream. Each of us had to pay approximately one U.S. quarter to gain access to the stream. Honestly, what am I looking at? As far as scenic visits are concerned, I have seen prettier streams elsewhere in Asia for free. I have seen prettier streams in backyards of family and friends back home. Don’t get me wrong, it was pretty, but it was also sort of pointless. One of the guys I was with even commented that he felt ripped off, and we were only talking twenty five cents in American money. It was more the principle of the thing, because we all felt the same way. One of the other guys with us had an infection in his foot, so he didn’t want to walk in the stream. When we got back to the jeep he asked us how was it. Let’s just say he didn’t miss much, and you wouldn’t either.

Wrapping Up

Following our stop at the Fairy Stream, we were all dropped back off near the tour agency. It was roughly around 7:30 a.m. and everything in town was still closed or just beginning to open. I went back to the hotel and began to pack up gear. After some breakfast, a failed attempt to go to the beach due to high tide, and a foot massage, it was time to check out. I grabbed a coffee and some lunch for my bus ride to Dalat. It was time to venture off to my next destination in Vietnam.

Overall, I had a good time in Mui Ne, but it was not as amazing as many writers attempted to make it. Many bloggers and travel writers made it seem like it was the greatest beach town on earth. Maybe you need to stay there for a while to fully appreciate it. Others said their biggest regret was not getting to Mui Ne. Don’t get me wrong, it was a beautiful place. The dunes were beautiful, and the sun only made the views that much more breathtaking. If the town was packed, I think I would have had a better time at night, but also would have had to deal with the problems that come with massive amounts of tourists. I am glad that I made a stop there. I don’t think I would go out of my way to go there again if and when I get back to Vietnam. If I did, it would be to go on one of the few other day tours available and visit a Cham dynasty era archeological site. However, if it is the choice between Mui Ne or Nha Trang I would have chosen the quieter and cheaper beach town of Mui Ne over the overpriced rates that you pay in Nha Trang, but that is for another post. If you go, definitely tour the dunes and skip the other minor attractions.