Once known mainly as a golf haven, the coastal city of Da Nang in Central Vietnam is fast emerging as a hub for other leisure sports. If you love adrenaline-pumping holidays, you’ve come to the right place
It’s 5.35am and My Khe, Da Nang’s central beach, is already buzzing. There’s a sea of scooters and motorbikes parked along Vo Nguyen Giap Street, a four-lane beachfront boulevard named after the late general who was instrumental to Vietnam’s reunification in 1975. It’s a morning made for moving, breaking a sweat and getting the heart rate up, and I survey Da Nang residents of all ages on the broad sand practising tai chi, jogging, tossing a Frisbee.
Less than two decades ago, this approximately 9km beach was a sparsely populated coastal stretch in Da Nang. Today, it’s a hive of constant activity and some of the biggest international hospitality groups have a stake on the strip, operating hotels and resorts across a range of price points.
Before developments such as Ba Na Hills – a hill station mountain resort with a leisure park and a Luke Donald-designed 18-hole golf course – and the Golden Hand Bridge took social media by storm, Da Nang had already made a name for itself as a golfer’s favourite, thanks largely to Central Vietnam’s long dry season that stretches from January to August.
Now, more and more travellers are catching on to Da Nang’s rare and enviable setup – a wide, activity-friendly beach within an urban sprawl and ample tourism infrastructure. All these are helping polish the city’s profile as a fun and active holiday spot ideal for all kinds of leisure sports.
Vietnam’s shoreline is a stunning 3,260km long, and Da Nang’s remarkably well-kept beaches – perfect for all manner of water sports – draw travellers from far and wide.
At Danabeach, on the south end of My Khe, adrenaline-fuelled water sports such as parasailing and wakeboarding are available on demand, with wait lists forming well before 8am. (It’s reassuring to know that since 2012, Vietnamese authorities have tightened safety measures for water-related activities. Life vests are a prerequisite and all lifeguards must possess a valid licence.)
For an average package rate of VND950,000 (USD$36), you and a travel buddy can be hoisted 120m into the air, thanks to a parachute and a speedboat. No prior training required, just the courage to be airborne for three to five minutes – an eternity if your legs are dangling in the air.
For an additional fee, a drone will record this moment of daring against a stunning backdrop of the bay and the picturesque Son Tra Mountain.
In a more private setting in the west end of the mountains, you can enjoy similar activities at Vietgangz Beach Club Da Nang, a group of beach-and-camping clubs across the country.
If flying high over the water isn’t on your list, perhaps a slow relaxing stand-up paddle on lightweight inflatable boards around a scenic bay is just what you need.
If you’re up for something more grounded, then Son Tra, also known as Monkey Mountain, is home to a 4,400ha nature reserve of the same name. Animal lovers will find several species of adorable primates, most notably the endangered red-shanked douc langur nicknamed the “Queen of Primates”.
The luxurious, Bill Bensley-designed InterContinental Danang Sun Peninsula Resort is located within the reserve, and part of its offerings are guided three-hour hikes through the jungle to behold an 800-year-old Banyan tree or along the mountain ridge to the breathtaking Son Tra Mountain summit.
BACK IN MY KHE, NET SPORTS TAKE OVER THE AFTERNOON. From 3.30pm every day, the Danang Summer Spikers, a Telegram-based volleyball players group, set up a private pitch for highly competitive and electric tournaments.
Most of the players are expats, but the community oozes an easy-going vibe and anyone is welcome to join. Several open game pitches with no player limit can be found on the same stretch, and finding groups to play with is as easy as searching for groups on Facebook with the keywords “Danang”, “Expats” and “Volleyball”. Perfect opportunity to flex volleyball and social skills.
When evening descends, the city comes alive with a new countrywide obsession: pickleball, a cousin to both tennis and ping pong, but a sibling to neither. Invented in the US in the 1960s, the sport is experiencing a boom across the globe. Reports credit this surge in popularity to the nature of the sport itself – compared to tennis, the play area is smaller, the paddle is lighter, the rules are simpler and the games tend to be shorter.
Just a short walk from My Khe beach, at 6 Point Pickleball, the action begins at 5am and continues throughout the day and well into the night. Owner Le Hai Anh, a Hanoi-native, set up the business as an excuse to move to the comparably laidback Da Nang. She tells me, “My son spent three years learning tennis. Now he has no one to play with. Everyone is into pickleball.”
The beachside facility – which features a café and lounge area, six professional courts and retractable canopies so you can play rain or shine – is one of a growing number of pickleball clubs mushrooming around the city. There’s a social element to it as fans encourage others to pick up the sport; if you’re up for a bit of serve and volley, lace up your trainers, rent a paddle and show up in court.
FOR ADVENTURE BUFFS LOOKING FOR A MORE SUSTAINED HIGH, there’s a fun option: motorbike rides. More than 70 percent of the elongated, S-shaped country rely on two-wheelers for their daily commute, and decades of riding motos has established a motorbike-and-scooter culture like no other.
Experience it yourself with a ride to the Unesco-inscribed Hoi An Ancient Town, a 15th-century trading port known for its mustard-coloured buildings, that became officially part of metropolitan Da Nang in July this year. Here, the local culture, cuisine and architecture have been heavily influenced by early Chinese, Japanese and Champa merchants, a delightful blend that draws thousands of tourists.
But motorheads make the journey for an additional reason – Central Vietnam’s lush rice paddy fields. It’s one of the highlights on tours by Onyabike Adventures, a tour outfitter founded in 2017 by Hawkmoon Boxer, originally from England, and Australian Jeff Burke. Today, it is one of the few fully legal motorbike tour providers based in Da Nang and an official tours partner of Royal Enfield, stocked with a fleet of 25 Himalayan 410cc motorbikes.
“Demand [for motorbike touring] has increased significantly over the last few years,” says Boxer. Da Nang is particularly popular. “People love the region’s coastal routes.” Onyabike’s tours vary in size, from two to 10 riders in a pack. The seven-day Highlights of Central Vietnam tour is a truly epic adventure.
In the 1,300km loop that begins and ends in Hoi An, participants will visit the ancient Vietnamese capital of Hue, and the Khe Sanh District in Quang Tri Province, known for speciality coffee and various Austroasiatic-speaking hill tribes.
Continuing onwards through the Ho Chi Minh Trail, riders will reach Phong Nha-Ke Bang, a national park and Unesco World Heritage Site in Quang Binh Province, home to the otherworldly Son Doong, believed to be the largest cave on earth.
If time is short, the Hai Van Pass and Monkey Mountain tour will take you beyond the Son Tra Mountain and over the stunning Hai Van Pass, a 21km coastal route offering panoramic views of the Lang Co peninsula.
It’s an exhilarating ride, one that, like the rest of action-packed Da Nang, will inspire you to keep coming back.
