An Binh islet, Vinh Long

An Binh is a farming islet that became a homestay islet without stopping being a farming islet. Before the 2025 reorganisation it covered four communes, An Binh, Hoa Ninh, Dong Phu and Binh Hoa Phuoc; today the whole islet is a single commune. A 2024 Nhan Dan report dates the opening of homestays and eco-gardens to around 2000, while a 2023 Tuoi Tre feature puts the first Delta homestays more than thirty years back; the sources differ on the date, not on An Binh being early. Tien Chau pagoda on the islet is generally dated to the mid-eighteenth century.

The homestays range widely. At one end are family houses with two guest rooms, where the host is also the cook and the gardener. At the other are houses that can seat fifty or sixty and receive coach groups, with rows of rooms and a dining hall. Both are legitimate. They are not the same experience, and the difference is the first thing we check.

Press coverage is honest about what has been lost. A 2023 Tuoi Tre feature describes households competing on price once nobody coordinated them, community clusters breaking into separate businesses, and the landscape changed by roads, sluices and concrete bridges. Visitors still find the gardens and the canals; they should not expect a pristine village.

One night is enough to know whether you like it: an afternoon in the garden, an evening in the kitchen, a morning on the water. Two nights is better, because the middle day is the one where the family stops performing and simply works, and you work with them. More than two on An Binh alone is rarely worth it; a second household elsewhere teaches you more. Our four-day trip does exactly that.

By road, Vinh Long is about 136 km from central Ho Chi Minh City along the expressway and the My Thuan bridges; allow two and a half to three hours. Buses to Vinh Long bus station take about three hours, with fares from about 80,000 VND in a 2023 guide. From Vinh Long, the An Binh ferry landing is about 3 km from the centre, and the crossing costs a few thousand dong. An alternative road via Ben Tre, Cho Lach and the Dinh Khao ferry is about 10 km longer and useful if you are coming from the Ben Tre villages.

An Binh is losing ground to the river. An August 2026 report in the agriculture ministry's newspaper, citing Vinh Long's agricultural project board, puts riverbank erosion on the Co Chien side, from the An Binh ferry landing to the Muong Lo confluence, at three to five metres a year on average, and describes a proposal of about 405 billion VND for some 2.3 km of revetment and an upgraded dike between 2026 and 2030, with the investment decision still to be made. More than 50,000 residents are affected. For a guest, the practical consequence is that some riverside houses are better avoided, and that construction may be under way during your stay.

• You want boats and markets more than gardens: An Binh is about the garden and the house
• You will be travelling on a weekend in a busy month and need a small, quiet house — they fill first
• October and November peak-tide days if your schedule cannot move around the ferry
• You need a hotel standard of comfort every night; sleep in Vinh Long and visit for the day instead

Trips that stay here: An Binh, 2 days and Two homestays, 4 days. Town notes: Vinh Long.