Ngoc Vung, or Gem Island, is a pretty site sitting between the Net and Phuong Hoang (Eagle) islands, in the Van Don District. Formerly, under the feudal dynasties, this island zone contained a great quantity of rare and precious species of mother-of-pearls. At night, fluorescent pearls would light up the whole region.

From above, Ngoc Vung looks like a beautiful velvet handkerchief with exquisite white edgings; it seems to float on the water surface. On the east side of the island there is a 1 km beach with pure white sand. At the centre is a luxuriant Benjamin fig tree; it was under this tree that Ho Chi Minh stood and conversed with the population in 1962 during a visit. During the war against the US, the island belonged to a front of outward islands that served as protection for the eastern waterways.

It is also on the beach that many stone artifacts were discovered in 1937, opening a string of excavations and archaeological research aiming at providing some explanations of the mysteries of the ancient Halong culture.

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