Travel + Leisure ranked Con Dao the most mysterious island destination on the planet. Beyond its reputation as a spiritual tourism destination, Con Dao, now part of Ho Chi Minh City, is also regarded as Vietnam's sea turtle conservation capital.
About 230 kilometres from the centre of Ho Chi Minh City, the archipelago has retained an almost untouched beauty thanks to its isolation and limited exposure to urbanisation.
From April to October, hundreds of green turtles cross the ocean to return to Con Dao to breed. This is also the season when domestic and foreign visitors head to Bay Canh Island in the Con Dao archipelago, where more turtles come ashore to lay eggs than anywhere else in Vietnam, to witness mother turtles emerging on to the beach and to learn about conservation work.
Bay Canh Island is home to Cat Lon beach, stretching about 850 metres, along with Xi Mang beach and San beach, forming ideal nesting grounds for sea turtles. By day, the island stands out for its clear blue waters, primary forest and rich coral reefs.
After dark, it becomes a maternity ward for hundreds of sea turtles.
Sea turtles are especially sensitive to light, so they usually come ashore only after nightfall. Their arrival also shifts with the tides. On some days turtles reach the beach from about 6pm, while on others some are still quietly hauling themselves on to the sand to nest close to 4 am.
Under a sky full of stars, glossy black shapes inch slowly towards the shore. The sound of their flippers scraping across sand and dry coral is heavy and rustling, like tanks moving through the stillness of the night.
Once a suitable spot is chosen, the mother turtle uses all four limbs to dig into the sand, lowering her body before scooping out a deep chamber with her rear flippers. When the hole reaches a depth of about 60 centimetres, opaque white eggs, each about the size of a table tennis ball, begin dropping in one by one.
Each mother turtle lays between 50 and 190 eggs in a single nesting session. Afterwards, she carefully covers the nest and may even dig decoy pits to mislead predators before returning to the sea. The breeding process lasts about three to four hours. If a turtle feels unsafe, it will return to the water and come back to nest on another day.
To avoid disturbing the turtles' breeding behaviour, all observation takes place under red light. Visitors may approach only under the guidance of forest rangers and must strictly follow rules on distance, lighting and noise.
After the mother turtle has finished laying, forest rangers and volunteers from the International Union for Conservation of Nature and Con Dao National Park quickly move the entire clutch to a protected incubation area. The aim is to prevent other turtles from digging into the nest, eggs being stolen or predators attacking them.
Visitors wanting to watch turtles lay eggs must register in advance with Con Dao National Park or licensed operators.
Meanwhile, each mother turtle is measured, recorded and fitted with two identification tags to track her breeding journey over the years ahead.
The survival journey of sea turtles is brutal. It is estimated that of every 1,000 hatchlings that return to the sea, only one survives to adulthood, overcoming natural predators, fishing nets and human pressures. That is why conservation work in Con Dao has been rigorously maintained for more than three decades.
According to Con Dao National Park, in the 2016-2025 period, more than 20,879 nests were rescued and successfully incubated, releasing more than 1.5 million hatchlings back into the ocean. Each breeding season, about 600 to 900 mother turtles return to nest, with peak years seeing close to 1,000 individuals.
After 45 to 60 days of incubation, hatchlings begin digging their way up through the sand. They are released into the sea at dawn, when temperatures are still low and predators are less active. With no mother to guide them, instinct leads the tiny creatures towards the sound of the waves and straight out to the ocean.
If they are lucky enough to survive, around 20 to 30 years later they will return to the very waters where they were born to continue the breeding cycle. Visitors can take part in hatchling releases for a fee of about VND 50,000 (USD 1.95), per session.
Visitors can also directly join conservation experience programmes organised by Con Dao National Park on Bay Canh Island, Cau Island, Tai Island, Tre Lon Island or Duong beach.
Participants work alongside forest rangers to clean beaches, level the sand, prepare incubation pits, mark turtle nests, patrol at night, assist with measurements, tag mother turtles and move eggs to incubation areas. Tour prices range from VND 11.7 million to VND 20.2 million (USD 450 to USD 777), depending on the length of participation.
Outside the turtle nesting season, Bay Canh Island also draws visitors with its rich marine ecosystem. It has intact coral reefs and is part of a Ramsar site known for many endemic species, including the giant land crab known locally as the tank crab.
Visitors can also climb Bay Canh lighthouse, the oldest lighthouse in Vietnam, built in 1885.
At night, Con Dao's skies are little affected by light pollution, allowing the Milky Way to appear in striking clarity. Many visitors choose to capture the moment through photography services priced from VND 450,000 to VND 1.2 million (USD 17 to USD 46), per session.
Its unspoilt beauty and near fully preserved ecosystem have helped make Con Dao a destination praised by many international travel magazines.
Con Dao is Vietnam's only representative on Lonely Planet's list of the 15 most rewarding remote destinations to experience in the world in 2026.
Linh Lam
