TUESDAY 30 SEPTEMBER – Phu Quoc Island

Phu Quoc Island is Vietnam’s largest island and has industries based around fishing, agriculture and more recently, tourism. Beautiful white sand beaches, clear water and fresh seafood attract visitors from around the world. Infrastructure to accommodate this interest is catching up, with hotels and resorts finding their space along the waters edge. The island is located in the Bay of Thailand so the waters are calm. Don’t bring your surf board to Phu Quoc Island. And the island has its place in the American War (Vietnam War). More of that later.

We hire a bike for the day and head off to explore the southern half of the island. The roads are variable, ranging from beautiful bitumen to bumpy dirt tracks. On the very southern tip of this triangular shaped Island is a fishing village called An Thoi. It’s a typical Vietnamese village, busy with industries of all sorts on the streets edge and bikes everywhere. The harbour is full of colourful boats and at this time of the day, they rest after delivering their catch so now all of the activity is in the fish markets. Its beautiful to see. Just north of this village are some access roads to some secluded little gems of beaches. Secluded from foreigners that is, because they don’t know about them and they are hard to get to via very rough roads. On our way to visit the beaches our bike spluttered and stopped, failing to restart. We curse the guy who hired it to us but fortunate across the road is a little mechanics shop. We push the bike across two lanes of traffic and up the hill to his shop and with little problem he fixes the problem. The mechanic is crippled in both legs making getting around very difficult for him. This is his business and he seems cheerful enough. We were so grateful for his help.

The first of these we visit is Sao Beach. The road in is very slow, even on bike. The island has rich looking soil that supports agriculture and rainforest. We pass through rainforest to get to this beach. It’s stunning. Sao Beach is just a very small fishing village in a magic location. The sand is so white and the water crystal clear. Cafés have set up on the waterfront and there are some hotels here for tourists that do find this spot. And there are some adventure sport options. Fishing boats are anchored about. The locals know what they have here and have probably been enjoying what’s on offer here for generations. Just south of here is Kheim Beach. It’s just as beautiful but not as developed for tourists. Both beaches are well know by islanders, particularly in the south and they come here for the setting and the sea food. The sea food couldn’t be fresher – straight out of the ocean and onto the plate. They have a unique kind of boat here. It’s woven into a round tub out of coconut leaves I think. This is sealed with some sticky sealant. There are many of these about on Kheim Beach. Fish is drying on nets in the sun. We lunch here on beautiful fresh seafood.

Back out on the main road is a remnant of the American War (or Vietnam War). I’m not sure if Phu Quoc Island experienced any fighting during the war but the Americans built a prison here for captured enemy. This instrument of the war was administered and run by the south Vietnamese Army (or puppet army) with ruthless efficiency. The prison is now a museum and visitors are free to move through and learn about it’s history. Torture and murder were tools of the trade by the administrators and their methods are well explained and displayed using information signs and fiberglass mannequins. There are some very graphic photos to ampliphy the message. It’s emotive stuff and what went on here was atrocious. Death would have been kinder. Nails hammered into knee caps and legs half sawn off, cophin sized barb wire cages in the sun, or buried up to the neck in dirt were just some of the methods used. So effective are the messages here that I was approached by a Vietnamese man and asked curtly if I was American. I replied then he added something in Vietnamese that I suspect translated to ‘Fuck the Americans’! In one of the sheds we could see the mannequins being made and painted, soldiers in their full uniforms, prisoners semi naked in ragged trousers.