Trip report April / September 2025 – Da Nang & beyond – Research if an elderly gay retiree can live comfortably in Da Nang, Vietnam

[bkkmfj2648]

Da Nang Trip Report – Day 1 – 24 April 2025

This is my active ongoing trip report for Da Nang, Vietnam.

I am in Vietnam for 130 days as part of my tax minimization plan, as discussed in this previous post:

 

As part of my tax minimization plan, I already completed 62 days in Cebu, Philippines – as reported in this post:

The additional objective is to see if I can find a retiree place that is similar to what I have back in Jomtien Thailand --> in Vietnam.  Consequently, I will search for hirise condos that are on or near the beach with balconies with sea views – as is commonly found in Jomtien. 

Some days prior to my departure to Vietnam, I decided to break-up with my Thai boyfriend (ex-money boy).  The fairy tale that I was hoping for never realized and so, I asked him to not accompany me to Vietnam – as had originally been planned.  I am deeply in love with him – so this decision was not taken lightly.  As my last “gift” to him, I decided to help him open a small business in one of the local Jomtien night markets.  He hated being a money boy ( he found that work very degrading and soul destroying over the long term ) and with this new business, he could free himself from the shackles and ugliness of being a money boy.

 

23 April 2025, in the late afternoon, I leave Jomtien for the Hyatt Regency hotel (formerly Novotel) at Suvarnabhumi airport.  I decide to use my preferred car service =

https://www.thelimopattaya.com/

and I am lucky to have Eve, the co-owner to drive me to the hotel.  Chatting with Eve, the 90 minutes passes quickly and we are already at the hotel.

Please note that the Hyatt Regency booking system produces a mysterious notice when booking this airport property – that the required checkout time is at 7:45 am.

Back when it was Novotel – this was not an issue, as the Novotel was properly adapted for the type of clientele that desires to sleep at the airport.  I had to sit on one of those Hyatt customer service chat lines for a while to confirm that I could check out at 12noon instead of the stated 7:45am.  I would imagine that this is a bug in the Hyatt reservation system that does not accommodate the flexibility required by a hotel that is located at an airport.

Upon checking in, the front desk asked me when I wanted to check-out and I stated 12noon the next day.  The hotel clerk confirmed to me that you are paying for a 24hour window – I was checking in at 6:30pm and I could keep my room up until 6:30pm the next day.  By the way, this hotel is not cheap, I paid 5,649.84 Thai baht (including taxes), where the base rate was 4,720 THB, which was already discounted by 20%, as part of their Grand Opening offer.  Last year, when it was still the Novotel, I paid 6,059.81 (including taxes).  So, we can clearly see that the Hyatt Regency brand will charge 6,779.81 THB (20% more) once the Grand Opening promotion ceases – thus an increase of almost 12% over the Novotel price.

Why do this?  Because I sleep better when I know that I am already at the airport – instead of worrying if I might make it in time from Pattaya.  I know, crazy – but “peace of mind” for me has no price.

For dinner I walked over to the airport ( via the underground tunnel which terminates at the Hyatt Regency – same tunnel that the Airport Link arrives in from Bangkok ) and I ate in one of the airport restaurants.

Semi ok sleep – still nursing the pain of the breakup – but I am happy that when I woke up that I am already at the airport.  Ate a wonderful breakfast at the delightful Hyatt Regency breakfast restaurant.

After check-out, I thought that I would just use the tunnel to walk with my luggage over to the airport and NO, the hotel bellboy insisted that I take the complimentary hotel van – which I did and within like 5 to 8 minutes I was already at the Vietjet  

check-in desk for my flight to Da Nang.

Everything went smoothly, as they only required to see my passport and Vietnam pre-approved tourist visa letter.

I applied for the maximum 90 day tourist multiple-entry visa via the official government site:  https://evisa.gov.vn/

Where the price is $25 USD for a single entry visa or $50 USD for a multiple-entry visa.  The process is easy and straight forward.  You should allow 3 to 5 working days for you to receive it electronically to your email address.

Around day 85, I will decide to:

• Do a border run to Laos via the highly recommended Lynn visa service    https://lynnvisa.vn/   

           to extend my stay in Vietnam for an additional 40 days,

• Or, if I find that I am bored with Vietnam – I may fly over to Surabaya in Indonesia to see my sexy Indonesian friend – or – go somewhere else that I haven’t yet been to, like Sri Lanka, to complete my last 40 days, before I can return to Thailand.

During the Thailand automated immigration exit turnstiles procedure - I asked one of the immigration assistants if I could have my passport stamped by an immigration official.

new automated turnstiles where you swipe your passport and can exit immigration at the airport.

They were very kind and accommodating, as I explained to them that I needed the physical exit stamp in my passport for:

• my 90 day reporting cycle,
• to prove that I was not a tax resident in Thailand.

My flight was on time and the 1 hour 45 minute was pleasant and non eventful.  This was an Airbus 321 which can accommodate 244 passengers and I would estimate that it was only 50% full.  I almost always choose the emergency exit seat (for more leg room) and that entire area was vacant – so I sat by myself.  When the stewardess asked me if I would accept the evacuation duties, I asked her if I would be responsible for both emergency exit doors – as there was no one seated in the opposite seat.  She replied, don’t worry, during the flight I will sit at the opposite seat.

The beauty of the Da Nang International airport is that it is very small – so, the immigration clearance and luggage collection is very easy.  My AirBnB owner, sent a family member (he was very sexy but could not speak any English).  For example, I was told to wait by column 5 outside of the main airport terminal and then a mysterious message appeared in WhatsApp =   “you go by human you”

==> Note that I used the Airalo  service to pre-load a Vietnam 30 day eSIM data plan, so that when I arrived I would be able to have instant communication services.  I will also eventually venture over to the Viettel office to get a physical SIM card so that I can have a local number, so that I can avail myself of ZALO  - Vietnam's answer to Thailand's LINE .

 

Before I could understand if an alien was coming to get me that sexy guy appeared and said my name and then motioned me to follow him to the Grab car pick up – where he came with his car to get me.

As the Da Nang airport was built by the French in the 1940s, it is very small and located right in the middle of the city, so the ride from the airport over to the beach Jomtien like area – My An – took like 15 minutes.  The actual owner was waiting for me at the condo building and brought me up to my 33^rd floor sea view condo with balcony.  She photographed my passport as per local regulations – gave me a tour and explained how everything worked in the condo.

My current AirBnB condo

View from balcony – looking north towards the Lady Buddha statue ( in the extreme right upper corner, you can see her white silhouette )

View from balcony – looking northwest towards the city centre across the Hàn River ( note the golden Dragon Bridge in the upper centre of the photo )

Map of Da Nang with the accompanying My An & My Khe beach areas - the Jomtien of Da Nang

Unpack and then head out to eat at the Country BBQ & Beer restaurant   

https://www.facebook.com/countrybbqandbeer

And I ordered the Houston Platter – which consisted of brisket, pulled pork, sausage and chicken wing, accompanied by a cold Saigon beer.

 

After dinner I went to one of the many nearby convenience stores ( note that Da Nang does not have any 7-Eleven convenience stores - Google states that the few that they have are in Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi ) to stock up my refrigerator.

Then I crashed and went to sleep.

 

End of day 1 in Da Nang – 24 April 2025

[10tazione]

What annoyed me most in Danang is crossing that horrible street between the beach and the buildings. They should put the road underground (is that possible near the sea?) and extend the pedestrian zone, or at least construct some bridges for pedestrians.

[Olddaddy]

I wonder if you could do Borocay next ?🏝️🏝️🇵🇭🇵🇭

[bkkmfj2648]

49 minutes ago, Olddaddy said:

I wonder if you could do Borocay next ?🏝️🏝️🇵🇭🇵🇭

I hope you are kidding or you are not already suffering the effects of Alzheimer's or Dementia ?

Our gayguides.com forum is divided by physical nation states with different geographical locations - as shown below:

Your reply about Borocay was posted in the Vietnam sub-division of our gayguides.com forum.  Boracay is part of the Philippines.

I already posted about my 4 days in Boracay (which you already commented on back in February of this year).  Below is the link to help you remember.

So, this thread is dedicated to Vietnam....

Thanks  🤩

 

[Olddaddy]

Could you do comparison reports please on Cebu vs Da Nang in terms of

cost💲 , lifestyle,transport , gay life 🌈 especially for retirees 

[vinapu]

2 hours ago, Olddaddy said:

Could you do comparison reports please on Cebu vs Da Nang in terms of

cost💲 , lifestyle,transport , gay life 🌈 especially for retirees 

first let him settle there , it's his 1st day , not 127th

[bkkmfj2648]

Day 2 in Da Nang – 25 April 2025

Prior to leaving Thailand I had arranged to meet up with 2 local famous YouTube bloggers.  This morning I met with Social Samy, https://www.youtube.com/@socialsamy

For a wonderful Vietnamese salt coffee at the Sun Coffee shop  on An Thuong 34 street.

He is German and very jovial and has been living in Da Nang for several years and even married a local Vietnamese woman.

He got me up to speed on all of the changes since I have last been to Da Nang – which was 1 year prior. 

• Beach erosion – the beach shorefront has shrank by at least 50%.  Samy told me not to worry, as this is a natural phenomena – and from next year forward the shorefront should start to grow in size again,
• Best bank ATMs to get large sums of money in 1 go – VP Bank and TP Bank – I also have my personal favorite, the HSBC ATM located in the VinCom mall,
• Best place to get a local SIM card = Viettel shop – I will discuss this later,
• Best place for a man to get his hair painted (colored) and cut = NHUA Style.  This is very important to me because my prior hair color experience in Vietnam – back in 2019 – was super complicated – as the male barbershop would not color my hair and sent me to the lady shop – but they had to hide me in the back away from other female customers – as they told me that they should not color my hair in public.  After they coloured my hair, they would not cut it and sent me back to the male barbershop.  Samy confirmed to me that NHUA Style would be able to color and cut my hair all in the same shop.

Samy is a wealth of information with the network that he has created here in Da Nang.  If you join his group you can purchase his recommended Google Treasure Map of Da Nang, which I did, and already it is very helpful to start my assimilation into my new temporary retirement home.

I enjoyed my meeting with Samy and he invited me to the next meetup, which will take place on Tuesday 29 April, in the afternoon in one of the local restaurants.

By now I was starving, I had only eaten a yogurt in my condo, so I head over my favourite breakfast place (that I discovered in my April 2024 trip to Da Nang), hoping that it would still be there and I was so happy to see that it was.

I order my favorite breakfast meal: Bò né  - easy to remember just think of boner and truncate the letter “r”.   Of course, I order another salt coffee.

In my personal opinion, this is where Vietnam has both the Philippines and Thailand beat – for the best breakfast category.  I can eat this breakfast meal every day.

I decide to walk over to the Viettel shop that was suggested to me by Samy to obtain my very own local Vietnamese local phone number, SIM card and Zalo installation.  As Samy mentioned, this shop is VERY helpful and very adapted for foreigners. 

I purchased the 3T5G160B Plan, which cost 480,000 VND for 90 days, with a 4GB daily allowance and free calls of up to 100 minutes per month.  The price for the new SIM card was 50,000 VND.  I also had to top-up my new ZALO  account with 10,000 VND.

Everything was completed within 30 minutes and my wait time in the queue was only 10 minutes.  I was very impressed with the service.  As the ZALO app (which is similar to our LINE app in Thailand) is all in the local language, there was no way that I would have been able to do the setup by myself.  They don't use LINE  here.

Then I decided to walk over to the Vincom Plaza mall, which was a very long walk, as I needed to buy towels that I can put on my 2^nd bedroom mattress to protect it from potential damage from massage oils and creams.

In Da Nang, I am only aware of 1 shopping mall, Vincom, and when compared with Cebu, it is very small – as the Vietnamese people do not have a fixation with shopping malls like the Philippine people do.  This mall only has 4 floors, of which the 4^th floor is dedicated to eating and the other 3 floors are for shopping.  So, the towel selection is limited to just 3 stores and I buy 3 large bath towels from the Japanese Akemi store. 

https://vincom.com.vn/vincom-plaza-ngo-quyen

I also decide to eat lunch at the mall and I visit the HSBC ATM that is hidden away down near the parking level, where I withdraw 10,000,000 VND (around 385 USD) – many of the other ATM machines in the city are limited to just 2,000,000 VND (around 77 USD), so by visiting this HSBC ATM I can limit the number of times that I need to refurnish my VND stock.

I also look for a computer monitor to buy, but in this mall there are ZERO electronic stores – as these types of stores are independent and not generally found in shopping malls.  So, this will be a task for another day.

As I am exhausted from all of the walking, I hire a Grab car for 50,000 VND (around 2 USD), which will take me back to my condo, which is 3km away.  So, transportation costs are VERY cheap.

I take a nap and later after my nap I return to the Country BBQ & Beer restaurant that I reported on in yesterday’s trip report update to eat my dinner.

Afterwards, I make a nice walk along the beach pavilion and then head back to my room, surf the internet for a while (looking to see which guys I can eventually get), and then go to sleep.

 

End of day 2 in Da Nang – 25 April 2025

 

 

[floridarob]

7 hours ago, bkkmfj2648 said:

surf the internet for a while (looking to see which guys I can eventually get)

and.... 🤷‍♂️