Amazing Cham Island (Cu Lao Cham, Hoian, Vietnam)
Written by Yen Nhi (yennhi79@gmail.com)
Friday, 03 August 2007
Getting out of the noisy crowded city, taking a break after a long time of hard working; we reached Cham Island by booking our tour with the Hoi An Beach Resort. I must say that getting back to Cham Island was my desire caused I was attracted by the beautiful blue water of the beach where I came 11 years ago. At that time, in a memory of a little girl of mine, Cham Island was still unexplored and there was no asphalted roads, just a white sand and hardly could I find a tile–roof house as most of the houses there are coconut and bamboo made and the life condition of the local people were very hard and I had to spend 3 and a half hour on the wooden daily boat, dirty, crowded and tiring to get there.
Some years recently I have been overloaded by a lot of information about Cham Island as tourism reaches there and make the potentials of this island become awake.
It took us now only 25 minutes from Cua Dai quay to get to the island. The fresh and cool wind made us feel so relaxable. Having not finishing a conversation with the lovely tour guide whose skin cannot be black any longer, a beautiful sight appeared in front us us, wow! a port with many fishing big and small boats, I recognized that it was Bai Lang-the only village at Cham Island where I came before. However, a lot of changes have been made. We saw many tile roof houses, small roads with good condition. Some children run to the port to welcome us with the requests for buying the rush leaf hats. Yeh, it was a good idea of selling caused many visitors needed them to cope with the blazing sun, I saw some buying them but we were well-prepared for the trip here so, to us, it’s not necessary. Then we visited the Marine Protected Museum where people displayed a mock up of the whole island on a table. So we could learn where the 7 islets of Cham Island were. And it was happy to see many beautiful pictures of some beaches such as Bai Chong, Bai Bim, Bai Huong, Bai Xep and some islets such as Hon Tai, Hon Kho,… at the South East of the island where swallows (chim yến) have been living and bringing a huge benefit to the economics of Quang Nam Province. It was also interesting to have a look at the imitate lobsters, corals, crabs, and other sea animals in the museum.
After visiting the beautiful Au Thuyen (a shelter for boats in bad weather), and Hai Tang Pagoda, we got back on the boat to come to Bai Xep for snorkeling. One couldn’t swim like me didn’t find that it was an obstacle caused life vest was available and your travel partner(s) who can swim may help pull you down into the water. I was lucky as the instructor and then my friend helped me to get deeply into the water. Oh! It was incredible to discover the wonders beneath the water. There were hundred kinds of corals, fishes, mollusks, water- plants and many other kinds of sea animals. Till now I still can’t forget my feeling at that time- it seemed that all sorrows and working pressure disappeared, the cool water, the life under the water made me feel so relaxed. One hour for snorkeling was still not enough for us. Ah, be careful not to step on any corals or you’ll break it and also your leg skin will be cut easily. We then got on board and they took us to Bai Chong for sunbathing and lunch.
We said OH when we saw the superb mountain, blue sky, and the islets on the way get to Bai Chong. I realized the reason why did people named this beach as Bai Chong, it was because of the rocks there, they heaped together and created such a beautiful scene.
We’ve been to many beaches of our country but we must confess that Bai Chong beach is probably one of the most beautiful beaches of Viet Nam. It’s protected by a 500- meter high hill and the back of it reveals a luxuriant forest immigrated by a lot of wild animals including monkeys that comes down to eat the newly ripe wild fruits and pineapples. Here and there on the hills, we could see the orangy blossom of wootung tree flowers (cây ngô đồng). I heard from my brother who often came here on biz that if you came to Cham Island this season, don’t forget to enjoy the beauty of this kind of flowers. It was the truth, but I thought the best time to see the real beauty is in Sep when all wootung tree flowers bloom on all over the hills.
The sand at Bai Chong was white and the wave was so calm, the water had such a unique blue color that one couldn’t find at any other place.
We continued swimming on the cool water, under the sun and then come inside to have a bath. There were umbrellas, mats, hammocks and some clean toilettes and bathrooms with showers. A set lunch with local seafood specialties provided by the only bamboo restaurant eased our hunger. Don’t worry about drinks there, local beers and soft drinks are available but you have to pay extra as it’s not included in the tour.
Hammocks were hanged on the coconut trees, and we lied down there, taking a nap. Suddenly a noise woke us up; we opened our eyes and with big surprise to find a small squirrel jumping from this coconut leave to others. The place was so peaceful. In the cool wind, under the shade of the coconut trees, we lied on the hammocks, my friend read a book about Cham Island that was just published and I listened to the beautiful songs from the MP3 player.
We then decided to spend our 1st night at Bai Chong while others sharing our tour returned to the mainland. The afternoon was our wonderful time of swimming and sunbathing on the beautiful beach. My legs were cut when I was not careful entering the water with a lot of rocks with many oysters. I was painful with the bloody wound, but fortunately, sea water was the wonderful antiseptic, the wound would soon get recover and I freely soaked myself in the water till dark.
Mrs. Phuong-the owner of the restaurant provided us a dinner with steamed cuttlefish, mountain crabs, steamed rice, local vegetables and a big bowl of the vegetable liquor. The food was very fresh, but if Mrs. Phuong was a good cook, our dinner would have been a highlight. However, it was Ok, we had no other choice and having such a meal without prior booking in a beach with no inhabitants was a good luck, we thought.
I didn’t know have you ever tried the mountain crabs (cua đá)? My companion was a big traveler but he had to confess that he had never tried such a kind of crab with delicious roe, it was black, a bit bitter at the time you put into your mouth but really sweet after that. This kind of crab lived in the small caves in the mountain and had a strong vitality.
That night was a full moon night. We went for a walk to Hon Chong (heaping stones), sitting together on a big stone, watching the bright moon, and wished time could stop here forever so that we could breath the pure air and cool wind, watch the light on the sea, listen to the wave crashed onto the shore. Over there at a far sea, some fishing boats gleamy appeared. If you come with your love, nothing can be as romantic as those moments.
A tent we hired in the afternoon was our shelter, but it was really hot inside, we had to open the side cover to let the wind went through. We talked together and felt asleep after that. At about 05:05am, I woke up with a start and what a nice surprise! I couldn’t believe that in front of my eyes, the orange moon was setting down to the beach. I woke my friend up to see that wonderful scene, taking a picture and keeping it a good memory. We were right when deciding to come to this island in full moon nights.
The next day with swimming and then returning to Bai Lang at noon by a wooden boat of Mr. Phuong, the restaurant owner. My friend just would like to stay at Bai Chong to swim in a quite place but he indulged my desire to share the life of the local people and visit some other beaches of the island.
There were about 2500 to 3000 inhabitants in 15 square km of Cham Island, but all of them lived in Bai Lang and Bai Huong. Other beaches were either still natural or protected to give places to swallow birds.
You should remember that there was no electricity in this island until now. People paid to some families who could afford to own a dynamo to get power from 6:30pm to 10 pm every night. Even if you had a hundred or even a thousand of USD and would like to have an accommodation as you wished, but it was completely out of your control caused there was neither hotel in the island nor the guest house with separated bathroom or toilette, we were backpackers and we actually would like to spend the life as the people in Cham Island did, and also because of having no choiceJ so we decided to stay in a bedroom of a family. This room was small, just had enough space for a bed, but it was clean, and warm. And a consolation was that from the balcony of the house you could see the beach, the hills and some daily activities of the local people. And also I learned from my close friend who used to work at MPA project that coffee here was more than delicious.
We started our discovery there by renting a motorbike and ride to Bai Huong (a fishing village with many people living). There was one road connecting Bai Lang and Bai Huong, you could choose to go by boat or by bicycle or motorbike to get there, but the best way was by motorbike caused it made you cool in the wind and you could easily dropped at any where you liked, but make sure that you were a good driver and petrol was full enough (no petrol station or any shops on the way there, except rocks, and forests ). Followed the instruction of the bike’s owner, we paid attention to find some beaches or some streams to drop at. It was so wonderful to see the impressive landscapes. On your left was the green forest with many kinds of trees, on your right was also trees with scattered wootung tree flowers, and after that was the beautiful beaches and hills. We were really excited with that wonderful natural landscape. We saw Bai Xep, Bai Chong, Bai Ong and some other beaches from the hight point.
Finally we saw a defile and followed this way. It leaded us to a quite beach that we thought we already saw it on photographs somewhere. Wow, a beautiful seaside, the sand is white, and smooth. There were a lot of rocks on the sea and they created a very natural unspoiled beach. The coconuts surrounded the seaside making up an extremely peaceful and wonderful scenery. There was a kind of grass that we thought it must be under the touch of human being caused this grass could just be seen at some resorts. We thought that it was Bai Bim and we were absolutely correct after asking a lady who was watering the grass. She said that there would be a resort here managed by Cu Lao Cham JSC Co. We took some pictures and then lied down on a grass-plot nearby. It was very cool and we dropped off to sleep on the grass. What a wonderful moments of life!
A 20- minute nap refreshed us and gave us a strong power to continue our adventure. We drove to Bai Huong –a small fishing village. The beach here was nice but couldn’t be as nice as the others.
Leaving Bai Huong, we carried out driving followed the road without knowing where it lead to!!! We were a little bit afraid of the motorbike caused it was not a good one, but the beautiful mighty landscape pushed us to go ahead. We found no body on the road and it seemed that the local people rarely came here. We bursted out laughing and felt very proud of our unique adventure .
We reached the end of the road and realized that it was the army base where we were not allowed to enter.
We then had to come back and didn’t forget to take some photos. Then what happened with us after that? Can you imagine? The motorbike was broken down and we had no tool to correct it !!! We once again bursted out laughing and had to walk back. No water left in the bottle, tired, perspiring and breathless. We wished there appeared anybody on the road and hoped that they would have some tools to lend us , but none appeared. I sweared that I would drink 3 and then 4 glasses of lemon juice when returning to Bai Lang J We walked and walked , up and down with the heavy bike on the sloping road for about 3 km, and so happy to find Mr Phuong-the restaurant owner in Bai Chong –on his motorbike coming to us, we stopped him and asked for borrowing something. Luckily, he was a cautious man and maybe he had to travel on this road everyday to transport goods from Bai Lang to Bai Chong ,so he had many kinds of tools. The bike was OK now and we could be happy again backing to lovely Bai Lang.
As desired, we asked for some lemon juice but both of us could only drink 3 glasses of that .Wow, the woman was an excellent “bartender”.The drink was delicious and we did enjoy it.
Nothing could cool us than soaking in the beach and so surprise that Bai Ong – only 900 meter away from central of Bai Lang was an ideal. If you would like to, you could visit Ong Temple on this seaside (the place where the local people workshiped Ong fish). We just would like to swim, sad that the next day we had to leave this peaceful place.
We turned back to the house, having a bath and went for dinner at a restaurant where we lunched and hired the motorbike. There were 2 restaurants in Bai Lang, one named Dan Tri (Dan was the wife’s name and Tri was the husband’s) and the another called Tinh (name of the lady owner). We chose Dan Tri caused the Tinh was closed J all day. I forgot to tell you about the people here. You must know that Hoianians are very friendly and honest, and the people in this island are even more friendly and honest than that . They are very sentimental and ready to help you whenever you want .
Differ from the lunch, Mrs Dan cooked for us a simple dinner but marked the hightlight of our trip. Remember that you should made a reservation for lunch or dinner in Cham Island caused there was no electricity, no fridge here, and people just stored enough food for each day. However, to us, the coincidence was the interesting thing. They just had some vegetables,some cuttlefish and steamed rice, but under the skillfulness of Mrs Dan, her braised cuttlefish was so wonderful. I aslo lived a city with many kinds of fresh seafood but I never tried such a delicious disc. The local boiled vegetables (rau rừng) and a home made fish sauce were also crazy. We ate a lot and till now we can’t forget the good taste of the cuttle fish and vegetables.
Night at Bai Lang was very lively under the moonlight. It seemed that the village awoke at night. People here leaded their daylife without electricity , so when the power was on (from 06:30 pm to 10:00pm) you could hear the voice from the TV, radio and even from some Karaoke shops here and there.
We sat on the bank looking over the sea. At Bai Chong, if it was windy, you would feel well, but if there was no wind, it was a contrast-hot and muggy much more than in the mainland caused it was near the beach.
We felt a little bit tired and went to bed early at about 9: 40pm, with the hope that the fan will lead us to a good sleep. Wow, we would like to share the life with the local people here, but it seemed that it was so hot and aslo the room was too small and only 1 small window in a house without garden couldn’t let the wind go through. I woke up many times and so did my friend but he was better than me, I called him “Pig” caused he always snored like a pig during his sleep!
The next morning, we were woken up by the noise from the hostess, she was preparing things to serve coffee for guests and we aslo heard the talks of her guests and aslo the music. I was surprised with the music caused it was then 8 am, but my friend told me that they might be using battery. Yeh, “Pig” was excellent in this point. We were joyful with the music we heard. We couldn’t understand anything, the lyrics were so funny (very sến), but we thought anyway, there were still music when you drank coffee in a place with no electricy.
We then went to the market to see what they sold, but quite different to what we thought, the market was so simple. The life-standard of the people here were still poor. We bought home some dried anchovy and cuttlefish and then went to Bai Ong to swim.
I don’t remember how many times we swam in Cham Island but we didn’t want to leave the island.
We returned to Dan Tri restaurant to lunch the last time and asked Mrs Dan to treat us the same menu as last night. It was also marvelous. We said goodbye to Ms Dan, she asked us whether we come back. We said to her “Sure , we will, in a soonest time we can caused we like this island very much.”
Day trip tour to Cham Island, please contact Booking Office at Hoian Beach Resort, Tel: (84 510) 927011 or,
Vietnam Impressive Travel Ltd: info@vietnamimpressive.com