Stop number two on our 2013 Winter South Coast Vacation was the city of Tuy Hoa, the largest city in Phu Yen Province. Phu Yen is between Binh Dinh Province to the north and Khanh Hoa Province to the south, and it is one of Vietnam's poorer provinces. This shows up in ways like highway maintenance; the stretches of Highway 1 in Phu Yen were some of the worst we've ever been on in-country. There is also little-to-no Western infrastructure; currently there is only one small English center, and one dedicated Western restaurant owned by a friendly US vet named Bob. A couple of modest hotels catering to Ho Chi Minh-based travelers is about the highlight of the Western business. However, it is a very beautiful province, and the city's lack of rapid development like many other Vietnamese cities has led to it being a very nice, peaceful “city”. Rice paddies exist right in the heart of town, the traffic and general pace of life is quite slow, and the people are quite friendly. I think Kelsey may have had a harder time with it than I did, but I rather liked this quiet and authentic Vietnamese town.
The town has long stretches of beautiful sandy beaches; however as it was late December, it was quite cold and shitty out, and even if it had been swimming weather the waves themselves would have ruled swimming out. Large, angry waves, churning and rolling in randomly and haphazardly, not behaving like typical swell, were all over the beaches and trying to swim in it would have been a serious ass kicking. So, we amused ourselves with other distractions and began being tourists.
Our first stop was Thap Nhan, the local Cham tower, which you can read about here. From the small hill that Thap Nhan sits on (a small near the mouth of a river and close to ocean...sound familiar?) you can see across the city to a large hill called “Chóp Chài” Mountain. It's quite tall, probably in the neighborhood of a few hundred meters, and a road goes to the top. Well, we decided we were going to walk to the top of it, so we drove across the plains, up onto the shoulder of it, and did just that. It wasn't too bad of a hike, although we didn't make the actual top as the loud and unfriendly dogs who lived at the towers on top weren't going to let us get any closer. Still, it was good exercise, and the views were quite splendid.
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After the mountain, we headed back down to town to see what else we could find to do. Bottom line: it wasn't much. There isn't a whole lot going on in Tuy Hoa, so after a quick walk to the beach, we found ourselves some burgers and pasta at Bob's Cafe, and called it an early night. The next day we would hit the bus station early and make our way to Nha Trang. All in all Tuy Hoa was a nice place and worth a stop. I don't know that I would make a point of coming here often, but for the option of just laying low and disconnecting for a few days, it is quite a nice destination.
All photos copyright Kit Davidson unless otherwise noted.