Unfortunately, our journey in Vietnam ended almost as quickly as it began. With COVID-19 getting more serious by the day, and with more and more countries enacting travel bans, restrictions and quarantine measures, six days into our trip, Connor and I made the decision to end our vacation so that we could return home to the US. This meant that Connor was coming home with nothing but the clothes he packed for Vietnam. All of his belongings were in Germany, but returning to Germany looked less and less like a good idea. For me, it meant cutting short the trip I had dreamed about for months. But that was less important than getting ourselves home where we felt safest and most equipped to handle this crisis.

We had been in Phu Quoc, an island off the coast of Vietnam, for 3 days before we made the decision to leave, so here are our adventures for those 3 days. Enjoy!

The primary goal for visiting this island was to scuba dive. Vietnam is not known for its world renowned reefs or marine biodiversity. It doesn’t have those things. Diving in Vietnam felt very, average. We knew going in it wasn’t going to be spectacular, but we did get to see some new and interesting things.

Like these white nudibranchs:

And these anemone fish:

And here’s some of your favorite people to show you just how ‘good’ our visibility was:

(hint: it wasn’t)

The visibility was less than good. On a scale of Puget Sound (worst diving experience I have ever had) to Belize (the most amazing diving I’ve ever done) this was a solid, ‘I don’t need to ever dive here again.’

Moving on.

For our last 4 hours on the island before we had to export ourselves home, we rented a motorbike so we could explore some more of the island, and because Connor really likes driving. We packed our snack bananas and water and headed out.

We made it to this ruin before we had to turn back:

And then, sadly, we had to leave. We said our goodbyes to Vietnam and vowed we would return someday. There was so much more we had planned to do, but it will have to wait for another time.