Nhà bè Tình Yêu — Rạch Vẹm

A floating restaurant out in the bay

Nhà bè Tình Yêu is a seafood restaurant on a raft in the fishing village of Rạch Vẹm, in the Gành Dầu area at the north of Phú Quốc. Foreign visitors know it as Love Float Farm. It is one of the best-known raft restaurants in the village.

The raft is not at the end of a wooden jetty but well out in the bay. The restaurant's own boat comes to the shore to pick guests up, free of charge, and carries them across the water to the raft. From there, all you see around you is sea, the village's boats and the far line of the shore. The space on the raft is roomy, enough for a large group.

A seafood meal on the water

The menu is fresh Phú Quốc seafood: salt-roasted crab, grilled prawns with chilli salt, and ốc nhảy (jumping snails). Rạch Vẹm fishermen go out to sea overnight and bring their shrimp and fish back to the harbour at dawn, so the seafood on the table comes from the very waters around the village.

After eating, stay on the raft. The water around Rạch Vẹm is clear and shallow, and from November to April it is starfish season, when thousands of orange-red starfish lie on the sandy bottom. Leave them where they are in the water and take your photos through the surface: a starfish can live only about thirty seconds out of water.

Sunset from the middle of the bay

What has made Nhà bè Tình Yêu's name is its view of sunset over the sea. The raft sits out in the bay, the sun sets towards the water, and the sky and the sea turn gradually orange together. That is the moment when the restaurant's name sounds most fitting.