Binh Ba Island

Seen from the shore of Cam Ranh Bay, Bình Ba looks like a dark green streak lying across the line where sky meets water. The sea around it is always dotted with floating rafts. Under each raft, a square of lobster cages hangs deep in clear water.

Bình Ba was part of the former Cam Bình commune. It now belongs to Nam Cam Ranh commune, in Khánh Hòa province. The island lies about 60 kilometers south of Nha Trang. It is one of two islands of the old commune, beside Bình Hưng. Its position is unusual. It sits at the mouth of the bay, a gateway in from the open sea, and it matters for security and national defense. The island lies inside the protective belt around the Cam Ranh military base, and official rules say that tourism is not to be carried out or developed there.

The people of the island live mainly from the sea and from raising lobster. In 2022, the whole Cam Bình commune had more than 10,000 lobster cages, mostly at Bình Ba. The yield was estimated at 270 tons. That is why the media often call Bình Ba the lobster island, though this is not its official name.

The name Bình Ba carries a story passed down by word of mouth. According to local telling, three people from Bình Định set foot on the island, made their living there and gave it its name. This is not an official historical record. Still, it matches something real. The community on the island has roots in the mainland of central Vietnam. It began as a small fishing hamlet and slowly became a settlement of island people with a long history.

That history reaches back much further than the hamlet. Ancient sites in the Cam Ranh area show that people have lived here for thousands of years. They include Bình Ba itself and its neighbor Bình Hưng. Another is Xóm Cồn. These sites belong to the early metal age, and the Xóm Cồn culture dates to about 4,140 years ago. The bay has been a home to people through many generations, before any name was written on a map.

The beaches of Bình Ba are hard to match. The best known is Bãi Nồm, where the water is clear enough to see the bottom and fine white sand runs far along the shore. Bãi Chướng and Bãi Nhà Cũ also have clear water and coral reefs. Bãi Nhà Cũ was once mentioned as a special place to see coral, where reefs of submerged rock spread out beneath a surface as still as glass.

Seen from the mainland, or from the sea on the way into the bay, Bình Ba looks peaceful, deep green, with the floating rafts drifting quietly on the water. Beneath that surface lie thousands of lobster cages, coral reefs growing in silence, and the memory of a land where people have lived since the early metal age. All of it is still there, like a secret that Cam Ranh Bay has kept since long ago.