Da Nang gains stature as a must-go destination

The Singaporean pay TV channel has included the Vietnamese city in a list of five under the radar destinations in south and southeast Asian regions.

It says that in Vietnam, the spotlight is mostly trained on the country’s two biggest metropolises – Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City, but Da Nang, home to Asia’s most beautiful My Khe Beach and neighbor to Hoi An, the ancient town, has plenty to offer.

Intrepid travelers can climb up the famous Marble Mountains, a group of five marble and limestone mountains, to discover “hidden caves, tunnels and Buddhist shrines galore,” it recommends.

The central Vietnamese city has gained greater prominence since its Golden Bridge opened in June this year.

The visually stunning bridge has been featured in CNN’s best travel photographs of the year, the news channel notes.

Once a sleepy fishing town, Da Nang is now a formidable tourism destination, gaining renown for its long beaches and upscale resorts.

The city received more than five million visitors in the first seven months of this year, up 30 percent over the same period last year, according to the Da Nang tourism department.

Travel magazine Live and Invest Overseas, “the world’s savviest source for top opportunities to live better, retire in style, invest for profit, do business,” voted Da Nang among world’s most livable cities earlier this year.

The site also recommends tourists to go on a safari in Colombo, Sri Lanka, swim in a volcanic lake in Indonesia’s Medan, go glamping in India’s Visakhapatnam and visit an island of silk-weavers in Phnom Penh, Cambodia.