One night in the village, which changes everything
Visiting a village and sleeping in one are different experiences, and the difference is the evening: the hour after dinner when the work is done, the neighbours arrive and nobody is performing anything for anybody.
At a glance
- Duration
- Two days, one night
- Group
- Maximum 8, four rooms
- Starts
- Hotel pick-up, 13:30 - 14:00 on day one
- Ends
- Back at your hotel by 11:30 on day two
- Difficulty
- Easy - the accommodation is simple, not hard
- From
- USD 148 per person
What the house is, exactly
A single-storey concrete house at Cua Can, three hundred metres from where the river meets the sea, belonging to a family who fish and keep a garden. Four guest rooms were built onto the side in 2019, each with two beds, a fan, a mosquito net and a window. Two shared bathrooms with hot water. No air conditioning, no wifi that you would call wifi, no lock on the front door.
This matters more than any description of the experience, so read it carefully. It is clean, the beds are good, the mattresses are firm and the sheets are changed for every guest. It is also basic in a way that a two-star hotel is not: the ceiling fan is the cooling, the shower is a hose on the wall, and the rooster starts at about a quarter past four in the morning and cannot be reasoned with.
| Rooms | Four, each with two single beds or one double |
| Bathrooms | Two shared, hot water, Western toilets |
| Cooling | Ceiling fan and a river breeze. No air conditioning |
| Power | Mains, with occasional cuts of an hour or two |
| Internet | A phone hotspot that works for messages, not for video |
| Meals | Dinner, breakfast, and everything eaten with the family |
| Distance | 25 minutes from Duong Dong, 40 from the airport |
The evening, which is what you are paying for
Dinner is at half past six at a long table in the open room at the front. Whatever came in that day: usually fish, usually grilled or in a clay pot, with rice, a soup, greens from the garden and a plate of herbs. The grandmother eats with you. Two or three neighbours normally appear.
After dinner the day is over for everyone and the hour that follows is the reason to stay the night. The men mend gear or do not. The television is on and nobody watches it. Someone opens a bottle of rice wine and you will be offered a glass, which you may refuse without anybody minding. Your guide stays through the evening and interprets, which is the difference between an evening with a family and an evening sitting near one.
It is quiet by half past nine. There is genuinely nothing to do after that and people who need something to do find this the hardest part of the trip.
Day by day
Cua Can - the river, the traps and the evening
Collected from your hotel between 13:30 and 14:00 and at the house by half past two. You will be shown your room, given tea and then left alone for an hour, which is deliberate: the family is not going to entertain you for eighteen hours and it is better for everybody if that is clear from the start.
At four we go out to the river mouth in a basket boat and a small wooden boat to set or haul a short line of crab traps, depending on the tide. This is real gear and a real line rather than a demonstration, and what comes up is what comes up - some evenings it is six crab and some evenings it is two and a lot of weed.
Dinner at half past six, then the evening described above. Bed whenever you want; the house is asleep by ten.
The boats at dawn, breakfast, and back
You will be awake at four fifteen because of the rooster whether you planned to be or not. We go down to the shore at half past five for the boats coming back, which at Cua Can is a smaller and gentler version of what happens at Ham Ninh - four or five boats, the family among them, and the catch sorted on the sand rather than a concrete ramp.
Breakfast at half past seven is rice porridge, or noodles, and whatever fish is not being sold. Then an hour in the garden with the grandmother, who grows pepper, lemongrass, chilli, papaya and a mango tree she is proud of, and who will send you away with something.
We leave at about half past ten and you are back at your hotel before half past eleven, which leaves the whole afternoon. Most people sleep.
Prices
| Group size | Shared room, per person | Private room, per person |
|---|---|---|
| 1 traveller | USD 235 | USD 285 |
| 2 travellers | USD 178 | USD 205 |
| 3 - 4 | USD 162 | USD 188 |
| 5 - 8 | USD 148 | USD 172 |
About sixty per cent of what you pay goes directly to the family as bed, board and boat. That figure is on the prices page along with what the other forty per cent covers, and it is the highest proportion of any trip we sell.
What the price includes
- Return transfers from your hotel within the standard zone
- One night in the family house, bedding, mosquito net and towel
- Dinner, breakfast, tea, coffee and drinking water
- The basket boat and crab trap line on the first afternoon
- A guide who stays for the evening and the morning, interpreting
- The garden hour with the grandmother, and whatever she gives you
- The flat fee we pay the family, which is most of the price
What it does not include
- Air conditioning, which does not exist here
- Alcohol beyond what the family offers you
- Travel insurance
- Tips - the family will not expect one and will accept one
- Pick-up beyond the standard zone, USD 8 per person
Gallery
Who this trip is not for
- Anyone who needs air conditioning to sleep. There is none, there will be none, and in April the room does not drop below about 28 C at night.
- Light sleepers without earplugs. Rooster at 04:15, dogs, and a family getting up at five. We send earplugs and they only half work.
- Travellers who need privacy. The bathroom is shared, the front room is shared, and the family lives in the same house.
- People who want a village experience without the village reality, which includes insects, a hose shower and a power cut roughly one night in six.
- Anyone who would find an evening with no planned activity uncomfortable. That evening is the product. If it sounds like a long time, book the fishing village morning instead and go back to your hotel.
Questions travellers ask most
Is it clean?
Yes. The rooms are swept and the bedding washed between every guest, the bathrooms are tiled with hot water, and the kitchen is cleaner than most street kitchens you will eat at happily.
It is basic, which is a different thing from dirty, and the two get confused in reviews of homestays everywhere.
What about mosquitoes?
There are mosquitoes, most actively at dusk and near the river. Every bed has a net, the house burns a coil in the front room in the evening, and we carry repellent.
Dengue exists on Phu Quoc. Long sleeves at dusk and repellent are sensible here and in your hotel equally.
Can children stay?
From about six, and it works better than people expect - there are children in the house and language stops mattering within an hour.
Under-twelves are half price sharing a room with parents. The 04:15 rooster is the real consideration rather than the comfort.
Can we book two nights?
Yes, for USD 78 per person, and about one group in five does. The second day is unstructured on purpose: the river, the garden, a walk up the coast, and lunch.
We would not recommend a third night unless you want to do very little, which is a perfectly good reason.
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