Overnight bus but the beach is worth it

Departing lovely Hoi An, we boarded the trusty overnight bus and settled in for a bumpy and mostly sleepless night. Six in the morning found us pulling into Nah Trang, a biggish city with a beautiful beach at dawn.

Nah Trang was not on our list of cities to visit, as its large and fairly developed beachfront just looked a little too much for us, but we figured getting on another 5 hour bus ride after an overnight ride was just too cruel. What with our upcoming visa extension, we figured we had time for an extra day here in Nah Trang. Thank goodness we did!

Nah Trang is actually quite a lovely city - big and bustling but clean and has a great beach. The only other big city with beachfront we have seen was Kuta in Bali which was extremely polluted, crawling with tacky tourists and gross chain restaurants. Nah Trang is a big city but doesn't seem to have too much overwhelming tourism and what it does have, like the parasailing, windsurfing, sailing and scuba diving, seems to help keep this waterfront and beach lively, well used and clean!!

We spent the afternoon at a hot springs resort about 10 minutes outside of town. There was a 7 step regiment for optimal health benefits from this mud bath/mineral soak wonderland. We were ushered into a tub with a Vietnamese couple which was full of cool liquid mud the consistency of a chocolate shake. A somewhat awkward 15 minute soak in this small muddy bathtub with another couple involved all of us pouring pails of mud over our arms, chests, and backs. Most local people were in shorts and tank tops and we quickly figured out why. The mud got well trapped in our suits, especially between the layers of the lining and the outside, and made us both a muddy, saggy, bloated mess! In this goopy state, we were instructed to sit in the sun for 10 minutes before rinsing. The ground and rocks were so hot from the super-charged sun we were forced to hop from foot to foot to not burn our feet. Quite a sight.

After a thorough mineral shower rinse, we were hustled into a 3 foot wide channel of rocks which sprayed water at you from all sides - imagine car wash meets leaky dam. After the pressure wash, we were pointed towards larger mineral hot tubs to soak with more strangers. After that, on to the big, but still hot, soaking pool. Keep in mind that it's a good 85-90 degrees out so at this point, we were not only pretty pruney but quite thoroughly cooked. We cut short our 7 steps to mineral-induced health and headed home feeling silky smooth with just a few pockets of mud in our ears.