Mekong Riverside Boutique Resort & Spa — Hotel in Xã Hòa Khánh

This was a real surprise. I was sent here by my travel agent, Nguyen Hoai at VivuTravel in Ha Noi. This is REALLY out in the countryside. The roads kept getting smaller and smaller until the car wouldn't fit any more and we had to shift over to a golf cart. Eventually, we worked our way through jungle trails until we came to this lovely pond with small individual huts on its banks.||Each hut is a separate accommodation with its own deck. You can fish for fish or shrimp off your deck. Since this is Vietnam, you use rice for bait. ||I thought it was going to be a quiet evening alongside the water listening to the crickets until the karaoke started blasting me from somewhere off in the jungle. I don't know what it is about Viet Nam, but they seem to have these wonderful, peaceful, idyllic jungle or seaside settings that are perfect for reading, writing, or just sitting and enjoying the sunset. Then they destroy them by blasting them with loud, thumping drum synthesizers and off-key singing at volumes that could knock down a small building.||Fortunately, the noise pollution didn't last too long and it didn't disrupt my sleep. I've had worse. Karaoke is the Japanese's revenge for losing World War II. It has been the bane of my travels throughout Southeast Asia.||Anyway, it is a lovely location and definitely worth a visit. Bring ear plugs because you might get some bozo sharing his idea of thumping noise with you from several kilometres away.||And it is HOT. Wow. Penguins are never going to migrate to the Mekong Delta. If your wife or girlfriend is always complaining about how cold it is, bring her here. No sane person could complain about being cold at the southern end of Vietnam. There is where Hell sends requests for more heat when it gets too cold down there. They have plenty to spare, believe me.||But still worth a visit. You can get away from civilization and into the deep jungle. At night you can listen to the thumping drum synthesizers of the natives and pretend you are in a Tarzan movie.||I have to commend VivuTravel and my travel agent, Hoai. I've been traveling in Southeast Asia for four months and every place I've been has been a unique experience. This is a relatively new facility but one which is worth a visit before it gets discovered and is swarming with tourists. ||That's the trouble with the world -- too many foreigners out there. See it now while...

On first arrival, the resort looked amazing and very different to where we had already stayed within Vietnam. ||Unfortunately our outlook on this resort changed very quickly, the pathways to the huts were broken and most of the lights were smashed. The rooms were a reasonable size yet the beds were very hard and uncomfortable, also we were provided with dirty bed sheets and dressing gowns.||We had allergens which was provided to the hotel before our stay and during, there were very limited options for both gluten free and vegan. The catering staff were very lovely. ||For our included breakfast, we were shocked to find the “fresh fruit” was covered in flies with a air con machine blowing air onto all the food… ||On a tour of the grounds around the hotel, we were shocked by how unkempt the are was, at the bird viewing stage the area Infront was all flattened and not a pleasant view. The area of plants infront of the hotel onto the lake was full of rubbish which would be easily cleared with a net (picture attached). ||There was litter all around the grounds.||The showers were not working properly, going from extremely hot to cold as well as the pressure changing throughout the shower. ||We were provided with mosquito nets above the bed, unfortunately these had holes throughout the netting and also had a large centipede that fell out when bringing the net down. ||Before bed time we discovered two live cockroaches in the bedding, which then disappeared under the covers, we were unwilling to search under the mattress as we were having to sleep the night there and were worried about finding more bugs there.||The hotel was advertised with a game area and gym, this was all broken and neglected, would be better off binned.||The reason for the one star if for the restaurant staff, who were so pleasant throughout our stay. without these members of staff we would have rated a 0...

This place offers amazing views on the Mekong River although....

The rooms are quite nice but the shower constantly looses pressure and fluctuates in temperature.

They offer spa treatments but I don't believe it's in service. We did check it out and would be amazing if it was up and running although we were a bit hesitant as the massage beds were covered in black mold.

Some plus' to the resort is they offer bicycles, kayaks, fishing and amazing gardens. For those who get eaten by mosquitos, stock up on insect repellent because those guys are in full force here.

The staff are friendly but they do struggle with the language barrier, which makes ordering things difficult.

There is one restaurant here which is quite expensive compared to your normal Vietnam prices. The food is quite nice and the breakfast is tasty although I would avoid ordering the steak which was a gamble anyway, it was so chewy I could of blown a bubble with it. They did advertise a bakery and cooking classes on their website but I didn't see anything like that here.

There's not much around the resort but the town is about 2km away where you can find very traditional street restaurants for a lot cheaper but they don't have a lot of tourism so there is a language barrier.

I would also be cautious about booking tours at the resort as they are more than double the price. We found a local who did a 4 hour private tour of the Mekong Delta for 600,000vnd where as the resort had a 2.5 hour tour 1,000,000vnd.

The accommodation at the resort itself was quite expensive and a bit of a pain to get to. I personally wouldn't stay here again but the views...