Important things you should know about Da Lat (or Dalat).
Da Lat City is at elevation (1,500m, 4900ft), making it much cooler than Saigon which is at sea level. It’s a good place to escape the heat in summer or winter. We visited in winter, it was not cold at all. We saw influencers in scarves and gloves for Instagram while we were in short sleeves.
Where is Da Lat in Vietnam? Da Lat is in the south of Vietnam, in the Central Highlands. It is north of Saigon, inland from Nha Trang. People normally visit from Saigon (Ho Chi Minh) or Nha Trang. It’s closer to Nha Trang (3 hour bus ride) than Saigon (7 hour bus ride).
The highlands area of Vietnam has a UNESCO listing for being home to a unique gong culture. It is also a UNESCO Creative City of Music.
Da Lat is a large, busy city with congested roads. The markets are huge. We didn’t think the night market was anything special, but the traditional local market during the day was interesting. The bus from Saigon to Da Lat takes around 7 hours and costs under $20. The views are great on the journey. There’s no way to take a train that’s easy, but Da Lat has an airport, although we couldn’t find any flights.
What is there to do in Da Lat? You can explore the town, walk around the lake, see the “Crazy House” (or even stay there) and visit several tourist attractions and gardens. There are some very beautiful places to visit around Da Lat, mountains, spectacular waterfalls, and unspoilt views. This tour covers all of the main highlights in one day. It’s worth doing
Da Lat is famous as a farming area in Vietnam, you will see acres of coffee plantations, flowers, fruit and vegetables, as sold in the local markets. The tour above will show you all of these things.
Is Da Lat Expensive? Dal Lat is a very cheap place to stay, making it popular with long-term travellers and nomads
Is is worth visiting Da Lat? We enjoyed Da Lat and we’re glad we went, but there are a lot of other places in Vietnam that we prefer.
Whare to stay in Da Lat? We stayed on the south east side of the central lake in a nice hostel. It had family rooms that opened onto the garden terrace, this would be perfect for a family on a tight budget. Take a look at this hostel here. You may prefer to stay on the other (NE) side of the lake to be closer to markets and restaurants. Hotels are cheap here.
More words and photos about Dalat, below.
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Da Lat
Accommodation in Da Lat
There are a lot of new hotels, luxury hotels, hostels, apartments and everything in between in Da Lat. They are all cheap, so maybe book a nicer hotel, or, as we did, a budget one, because we thought it looked cute. We stayed at the Red House Hostel Da Lat, and loved it. Sometimes we spend more, sometimes less, it depends on our needs.
The Dalat Palace Heritage Hotel is a stunning 5 star, one of the best hotels in Da Lat. It looked incredible and was much cheaper than similar hotels elsewhere. It’s on Booking.com here and on Agoda.
Da Lat Markets
Food in Da Lat
Dalat is famous for pho Da Lat, or pho Dalat, the local version of pho. We didn’t try it, unfortunately. We did try “Dalat pizza” which is a famous Dalat street food at the night market. We didn’t like it. It was topped with some sort of spam and synthetic mayonnaise.
Dalat street food generally didn’t appeal. Barbecued eggs, corn, various vegetables and meats on sticks. We ate upstairs in the covered market a few times, there is a large food court. We had some good Vietnamese meals there at great prices.
We did find some very good Italian pizza at a restaurant in Dalat. It was called Primavera Italian Restaurant. It’s on the map here. We liked this area; the street art photo in our photo gallery (above) was taken from the restaurant’s balcony.
We also tried a Chinese restaurant in the night market area. That’s very unusual for us, but we couldn’t find anywhere else. My son had frog. What we ordered was pretty good, and the restaurant seemed popular with Chinese tourists.
Things To Do in Da Lat
The best things to do in Da Lat are outside the city. Some of the waterfalls and temples we visited were outstanding. You can also visit farms, see civets making coffee, rice whisky being brewed, a silk farm, and more. A tour like this will take you to all of these places for an incredibly low price.
The waterfall above is Elephant Waterfall – Thác Voi, which you can see from the incredible Linh Ẩn Pagoda. The pagoda complex is huge and extremely beautiful, it’s home to another of Vietnam’s Guan Yin, Lady Buddha, statues, as in the photo below. The statue of Guan Yin is the tallest in Vietnam at 71m. You may have seen the one in Da Nang, which is 67m tall. This would be my #1 must-see near Dalat. My #2 would be Pangour Waterfall, in the photo above.
We saw these things on our motorbike tour from Da Lat to Saigon, but you can easily see these as day trips from Da Lat. They are very inexpensive.
For us, yes, Da Lat was worth visiting, but we’ve been visiting Vietnam for over 20 years, and this was our first time in Da Lat. It’s not in our top 5 places to see in Vietnam, maybe it would be in our top 10. Our top 3 would be Hanoi, Hoi An, and Saigon (Ho Chi Minh) then I’d be scratching my head. It was pleasant for a few days but Dalat City itself doesn’t have much charm. We probably wouldn’t go back. The places we saw on our tour from Dalat were very interesting, and Linh An Pagoda, in particular, was very much worth visiting. We hope you enjoy your time in Vietnam. Will you visit Da Lat?
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