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Hai Yen Hotel
Our swimming poolWhen we stepped out of the train station at Phan Thiep we thought we had been transported back to India. The persistent taxi and motorbike drivers offering to take us the 16km to Mui Ne were as determined and dogged as all of Delhi's tuktuk drivers. We smiled saying "no thank you, we take the bus" whilst atempting to walk away. "No, no bus, there is no bus to Mui Ne" they agitatedly shouted back, chasing us as we went. Eventually we spoke to an honest hairdresser who confirmed that of course there was a bus, and pointed us in the right direction. Twenty five minutes and a coffee stop later our bus dropped us right outside our chosen hotel in Mui Ne for a fraction of the price the touts were suggesting.
Hai Yen hotel was one of many options along the almost resort-like strip beside the beach but a few things made it stand out. It was at the quieter end of town and also nearer to the dunes, it was just $12 and it had a beautiful swimming pool. We're getting used to every hotel we stay in having a pool, how long can this last!
Despite the abundance of hotels this elongated town still had a low key feel and certain tourist facilities were lacking...like a bank. That afternoon Lewi hired a moto-taxi to search for ATM's and came back not with money but with a handful of tamarind fruit which his driver had picked for us. It is a sticky, chewy and sour tasting fruit but addictive all the same.
The main reason people come to Mui Ne is not for the beach or the extremely busy local fishing village (although they are both lovely) it is to see the astonishing sand dunes. So the following day we rented a moped and set off to explore them at our leisure. It was quite a long drive and so we broke up the journey by taking a walk along the so called 'Fairy Stream'.
The stream is shallow and flows through a patch of dunes which have developed amazing rock formations looking almost like stalagamites. With burnt orange and white sand, bright green grasses, palm trees, and a perfect blue sky the colours were almost too vivid. The red sand had turned the water a chocolately brown and the scene looked like a
Cadbury's river flowing through a make-believe landscape to the sea. It was beautiful and the water was warm as we paddled our way to the waterfall and back.
That walk was worth the journey alone, but the enormous white sand dunes took our breath away (when we finally found them). The dramatic coastal road we were driving along provided entertainment and refreshment if not directions. When we stopped and climbed across red sands to admire the view to a rocky islet in the bay the sand beneath our feet turned out to be sinking clay, luckily we escaped with just Lewi's foot and ankle covered in the goo.
Our first sight of the desert dunes was of a shimmering whiteness on the distant horizon, as we got closer we could see just how huge the expanse of sand was. Positioned beside a lotus flowering lake the brilliant white of the sand is incredible. The road to reach it is less than ideal and we had a slight sand skid, but arrived in one piece. By now it was 3pm but with the sun still burning fiercely down on us it felt as though we were entering a desert.
But what a stunning place to be, it is a photographers dream with the wind and clouds creating beautiful patterns on this sandy canvas. We trekked around trying to take in this unreal environment of sparse desert just a couple of kilometres from the sea with mountains in the distance.
The intense heat drove us to the shelter of shade where we drank litres of water and then back on the bike we retraced our steps to a second set of sand dunes.
These were red sand and although they were much busier and to us less dramatic than the white dunes they were still impressive. A small crowd gathered to watch the sunset but then all hurried back to their coaches and we were left to enjoy the after glow all by ourselves.
A local business here is to send your children out into the dunes to bamboozal tourists into having a go at sand sledging. We'd watched some pathetic attempts at the white dunes where top speeds of 1mph were reached, but at the red dunes after sunset the kids themselves were queuing to have a go and they were achieving much faster results. We
decided to have a go, the slope was pretty steep and the sand was compact, we went shooting down the hill and emerged totally covered in sand but smiling.
That evening, after many showers to get the sand off, we toured the markets and restaurants of Mui Ne eating BBQ'd fresh scallops and drinking bia hoi, perfect.
The next day we headed up country, passing stunning scenery to Nha Trang a touristy beach town where we didn't stay, just hopped straight on to a sleeper bus to Hoi An. The transport in Vietnam has been really good and well organised. The sleeper bus had fully reclining beds, duvets and a/c, better than some of our previous hotel rooms!
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Paul
non-member comment
Yes, there are ATMs in Mui Ne.
Hi there, I just google ATM in Mui Ne, and I see there are a few ATMs over there, but no bank. Therefore, I think your moto-driver misunderstood your request. Happy travels! Paul