The island's many natural endowments make it perfect for this. White beaches, evergreen trees, blue waters. And of course, resorts have sprung up to cater to the new kind of visitors.

This Wednesday, Saigontourist Holding Co. broke ground for adding rooms and services to the Saigon-Con Dao Resort, built in 1995 with seven villas.

The VND80-bil resort will have 90 rooms and a 160-seat restaurant and offer more entertainment services, including sea sports and cultural shows.

Saigontourist chairman Do Van Hoang said the project would contribute to push along tourism development on Con Dao with more foreign and local holiday-goers alike expected to arrive.

As part of next week's Ba Ria-Vung Tau Sea Festival, Con Dao is hosting many activities for tourists, including biology tours, beach volleyball, basket boat races, raft races and swimming, from last Saturday to April 16.

This all is right in line with a larger plan that the prime minister approved to turn Con Dao into a high-quality economic and tourism area until 2020.

In recent years, flight and ship routes to Con Dao have increased. To get there, tourists now have many choices.

HCM City offers a flight every Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday. From next Monday to April 16, there will be five flights for those who want to join the Sea Festival extension on the island.

From Ba Ria-Vung Tau Province, a helicopter flies three times a week to the island. During the Sea Festival all of next week, it flies every day.

For more information, contact: Saigon-Con Dao Resort: 18 Ton Duc Thang Street, Con Dao District, Ba Ria-Vung Tau Province. Tel: (064) 830 336. Email: sgtcd@hcm.vnn.vn. Website: www.saigoncondao.com