Chàm Islands
Cliff-rimmed islands where families harvest edible swiftlet nests from pitch-dark sea caves.
Location
About this audio guide
This guide to the Chàm Islands off Hoi An follows the birds that make its cave walls worth a fortune: swiftlets that glue nests to bare stone using nothing but saliva, navigating pitch-black caves by echolocation like bats. You'll hear the local legend of Nang Yen, a shipwrecked woman said to have copied the birds out of hunger, and meet the families of Thanh Chau village who still climb these cliffs on hand-lashed bamboo scaffolding each spring and summer. Look up at the dark cave mouths above you and imagine the colonies hidden inside, never touched by artificial light.
This audio guide was created using AI.
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