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But unlike Phuket and Bali, Da Nang is not an island. As Vietnam’s third-largest city, it is beckoning guests from China and South Korea with luxury hotels and convenience.
Proximity is its calling card. Its airport, city center and beaches are situated nearby one another. And it doesn’t hurt that huge numbers of vacation seekers are a handful of hours away.
In December, the Hilton Da Nang became the latest upscale Western hotel to offer views of the sun rising over the South China Sea, taking its place near the Intercontinental and Hyatt Regency. And there are plans for Da Nang’s coastline to be dotted with other big hospitality names from the West.
The city might have another thing going in its favor — perception. It is not dogged by the safety concerns nor plagued by natural disasters.
Last summer, a sudden storm off Phuket capsized and sank a tourist boat, killing 47 Chinese. In Bali, Mount Agung has been erupting since 2017, when it grounded flights and stranded tourists.
In the past several years, a Da Nang travel agent told Nikkei Asian Review that the pace of growth in Da Nang has far exceeded that of Phuket and Bali, thanks to the city’s good public safety record and lower risk of natural disasters.
The number of hotel rooms in Da Nang has roughly tripled in the past five years. During the same period, domestic and foreign visitor arrivals soared about 2.5-fold. In 2018, Da Nang attracted some 7.6 million tourists, many of them Chinese and South Korean.
Although Da Nang is being compared to Phuket and Bali, its arrival numbers are between one-third and half of the comparable figures for its Thai and Indonesian rivals.
Seoul is about a US$300 budget flight away from the emerging resort. “I am happy to be able to come here from Seoul in five hours,” a 45-year-old South Korean engineer who has been to Da Nang twice was quoted by Nikkei Asian Review as saying. “I think its landscape and beach are very beautiful.”
China is even closer to Vietnam. According to a public servant living in Beijing, Da Nang resembles China’s Hainan Island, which has delicious food and reasonable prices.
Da Nang was once well-known for the role it played during the Vietnam War. The US built key military installations in Da Nang, including what is today’s airport. In 1965, the first US combat troops to enter the war came ashore at Da Nang.
Now Da Nang is attracting a different kind of attention. In Airbnb’s 2018 rankings of trending travel destinations, Da Nang finished No. 5 globally and No. 1 in Southeast Asia. US-based Airbnb is the world’s largest vacation booking website.
Unlike Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam’s two largest cities, Da Nang does not fill visitors’ ears with incessant motorcycle and other noises. Time passes more slowly in the city of over a million, too.
For tourists who want to explore more of the country, three World Heritage sites are a single day’s journey away.
One is the ancient city of Hoi An, which hearkens back to its days as an important trading port. Its restaurants, boutiques and streetscapes maintain an old-time ambience.
Hoi An is also home to the Japanese Bridge, whose image is printed on 20,000-dong bank notes. The span is said to have been originally constructed in the 1590s by the town’s Japanese community.
The My Son Sanctuary and Complex of Hue Monuments are the other nearby World Heritage sites.
Vietnam’s Da Nang poaches tourists from Phuket and Bali Related image(s)
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