5 tourist destinations on April 30 without flying from Ho Chi Minh City

With the April 30 holiday, tourists from Ho Chi Minh City have many options to travel by road with a time budget of 1-4 days, avoiding expensive airfares.

Mr. Minh Quan, a traditional manager at a travel agency in Ho Chi Minh City, gives 5 suggestions for tourists who want to travel from Ho Chi Minh City, easily book a bus, have convenient routes for personal vehicles and can prepare their own schedule a week before the holiday.

Tuy Hoa - Song Cau

This destination is suitable for a 3-4 day trip. According to a survey, the price of a round-trip air ticket from Ho Chi Minh City to Tuy Hoa during the holidays is 4 million VND. Tourists can choose a bus with a travel time of about 9 hours, taking a night trip to save travel time. A round-trip bus ticket from Ho Chi Minh City to Phu Yen during the holidays costs nearly 1.7 million VND, an increase of more than 50% compared to normal days.

Stay in Tuy Hoa for 1-2 days then go to Song Cau, 111 km away, by local bus 08, running from 5am to 6pm, every 30-45 minutes. Bus ticket Tuy Hoa - Song Cau is about 10,000-15,000 VND.

Song Cau town is not yet a popular destination for most tourists, about 111 km from the center of Phu Yen, about 70 km from Tuy Hoa. This place is surrounded by undulating hills interspersed with plains, bringing the bustling atmosphere of coastal fishing villages at dawn.

Cu Mong Lagoon in Song Cau town. Photo: Quynh Mai

In addition to relaxing and enjoying the sea view, visitors can explore the local life in Song Cau. The Song Cau Discovery Tour takes visitors to the Mo O ball weaving village in Hoa Thanh village, Xuan Canh commune. Visitors will be guided, try making balls, hold a machete to push the Mo tree to split bamboo, use the bamboo core to light a fire, weave mat into a ball shape and then put the ball inside.

Making rice paper with coconut water is also a must-try activity during the day in Song Cau. The town has more than 1,000 hectares of coconut land. Locals often use coconut meat and coconut water to make porridge, sticky rice and handmade rice paper with coconut water. Visitors can buy rice paper, make their own dough and enjoy it directly at a local handmade rice paper making facility.

Riding a basket boat and catching fish in Cu Mong lagoon is an experience not to be missed when coming to Song Cau. Coming to Cu Mong lagoon, visitors will go out to sea with fishermen on basket boats to catch seafood. After going out to sea, visitors will enjoy the seafood they have caught.

Buon Ma Thuot, Dak Lak

The April 30 holiday is the last chance to enjoy the dry weather in Dak Lak before the rainy season from May to November. About 350 km from Ho Chi Minh City, visitors can reach the famous tourist destination of the Central Highlands by car in 8 hours. Bus tickets from Ho Chi Minh City to Buon Ma Thuot range from 200,000-400,000 VND on weekdays, and about 720,000 VND round trip on holidays.

From the center of Buon Ma Thuot city, within a radius of about 50 km, there are many places to explore. The beautiful natural landscapes are quite far from the city, so it is suitable for a 3-day, 2-night trip, or longer if you want to explore more.

Dray Sap Waterfall is about 30 km from Buon Ma Thuot City, 2023. Photo: Ngoc Loan

Tourist attractions include Buon Don Tourist Area, Crocodile Lake about 40 km from Buon Don, Yang-tao Elephant Rock, Dray Nur Waterfall - Dray Sap Waterfall, and the ancient pottery village of the M'nong Rlam people in Yang Tao commune.

There are many accommodation options if you stay in the center of Buon Ma Thuot city. Muong Thanh Hotel, Thanh Mai Hotel, Nice, Bazan Xanh, Biet Dien, Elephants, Sai Gon Ban Me, Hami Garden are highly rated accommodations on online platforms. Prices range from 300,000 to 900,000 VND per night. Some homestays include Zan Homestay, Lee's House, Doi Sao homestay with prices ranging from 300,000 to 1,200,000 VND per night.

If you go in a large group, you can stay in Ban Don tourist area or Lak lake to be close to nature. Lak Tented Camp is a famous lakeside resort in Buon Ma Thuot.

Suoi O Beach, Binh Chau, Ba Ria - Vung Tau

If you are familiar with Vung Tau or Ho Tram beaches, you can visit Suoi O beach in Binh Chau, Xuyen Moc district for a new experience. This location is more than 100 km from the center of Ho Chi Minh City, about 58 km from Vung Tau city, suitable for traveling by bus or personal vehicle. Suoi O beach is located about 3 km from Binh Chau market, on the way to Binh Chau hot spring. The reasonable time to explore this location is 2 days 1 night, or 3 days 2 nights if you plan to stop in Binh Chau or Ho Tram.

The sea here is peaceful and has few big waves, the sandy shore is flat, there are no reefs, suitable for families with the elderly and children. Because it has not been exploited much, the sea still retains its pristine and wild beauty with a few basket boats anchored on the sand. From Suoi O beach, go straight towards Binh Chau market and pass by Binh Chau port area. This is a gathering place for fresh seafood trading, visitors can stop by to buy and take away or enjoy at the fish raft.

Currently, Suoi O beach does not have any overnight accommodation services. Visitors can visit during the day or camp overnight on the beach. Other options include staying in Ho Tram or Binh Chau, these two locations have all types of accommodation from high-end resorts to hotels, homestays to glamping.

Binh Duong

From late April to early May, Binh Duong enters the fruit harvest season, the most famous of which is mangosteen. This is a good time for tourists to visit the gardens and experience. Binh Duong center is about 30 km from Ho Chi Minh City, taking 45-90 minutes by car depending on traffic conditions. Binh Duong has many tourist, ecological and entertainment areas associated with nature. Visitors can choose to have fun during the day or 2 days 1 night. Within a radius of about 40 km from Thu Dau Mot city center, there are many places to have fun and explore, from ecological tourist attractions to historical sites and famous landscapes.

Destinations suitable for nature lovers include Kawazo Phu Thinh Eco-tourism Area, Phu An Bamboo Village, Truc Lam Thanh Nguyen Zen Monastery, Lai Thieu Fruit Garden, Dau Tieng Lake. Some historical sites worth visiting include Tay Nam Ben Cat Tunnels, Dai Hung Ancient Pottery Village, and Tran Van Ho Ancient House.

Dau Tieng Lake taken from a passenger boat, with Ba Den Mountain towering in the distance and hundreds of buffalo grazing below. Photo: Nguyen Thanh Tuan

Binh Duong has many accommodation options, from budget to luxury. Luxury hotels include The Mira, Fairfield by Marriott, Becamex Hotel, Hiive by Fusion, Citadines Central Binh Duong with prices ranging from around one million VND per night. 3-star hotels costing from 400,000 to 600,000 VND include Long Bao Chau, Saigon Park, Elizabeth, Hoang Hung, homestays and serviced apartments.

Tien Giang

This destination is suitable for day trips and families with young children. The recommended experience when coming to Tien Giang is to visit a cocoa garden and learn about the handmade chocolate production process. Visitors can observe the process firsthand and make a chocolate bar themselves in Cho Gao garden for the day, at a cost of about 300,000 VND. This is an interactive experience, different from the usual tours of the Western garden.

After visiting the garden and workshop, the workshop’s artisans will guide each guest to pour and package a chocolate bar and take it home for free. At the product display area, visitors are invited to taste many flavors of solid and liquid chocolate.

Besides visiting the cocoa garden, visitors can also participate in folk games such as fishing, tug of war, fruit picking, and eating banh xeo in the garden space.

From Ho Chi Minh City, visitors can go to Cho Gao cocoa garden by motorbike, car, or bus for 85,000 VND one way, including shuttle bus to or from the garden. The garden is usually open from 7am to 5pm.

(According to 24h, April 22, 2024)

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