Alma resort in Cam Ranh City, Khanh Hoa Province. The resort will reopen on January 15. — Photo courtesy of Alma

Eight months after Alma’s closure, prompted by COVID-19’s resurgence in Viet Nam, the 30-hectare resort will reopen on January 15 hoping for a brighter future.

Since the resort's closure from May 16, Alma’s managing director Herbert Laubichler-Pichler said his team has kept busy developing a host of new capacities and services in readiness for the reopening, ranging from kickstarting a major solar power project and undergoing extensive training to developing a ‘back of house’ tour and enhancing Alma’s very own mobile app.

The team is also readying the resort for Tet on February 1, to be marked with a six-day programme filled with entertainment such as traditional games and competitions, an outdoor cinema on the beach, kite flying competitions, lively singalongs and more. The vast lobby will be transformed into a traditional “Tet Village” with huts brimming with snacks and drinks.

“We’re cautiously optimistic about 2022 for a tourism industry that was brought to its knees by the pandemic,” Laubichler-Pichler said. “Things will gradually pick up but it’ll take time before tourism numbers come back to the levels of demand we experienced after Viet Nam’s first lockdown, or even the second lockdown for that matter.” — VNS