The most family-friendly resort you’ve never heard of

When I arrive at Alma Resort, I am a bit like that lifeguard – very, very dubious.

It is a 30-hectare sprawling conglomeration of elements, the most alarming to me of which are two huge and not very architecturally attractive tower blocks set to the rear of the property and seemingly looming over it.

In these, 384 of its 580 suites are found and what their encasing lacks in attractiveness they make up for inside. They are enormous one- to three-bedroom, stylishly appointed affairs with balconies affording incredible views of sunsets over Cam Ranh Bay and the South China Sea.

And then there’s the fact that the resort is an absolute river of plenty when it comes to amenities and entertainment – lazy or otherwise. An 18-hole mini-golf course, tennis courts, sports of many kinds including motorised water sports, a 70-seat cinema, 13-treatment-room spa, unbelievably well kitted-out kids’ clubs (two, one each for different age groups), a spectacular array of eateries including a food court and mini-mart – and 12 swimming pools.

That’s not including the water park and also not including the many plunge pools that come with the downstairs apartments in the double-storey “Pavilions”, the super spacious upper-end accommodation set down near the beach in which I am lucky enough to be staying and which seem like a whole other place compared to the area around the towers.

So in the spirit of “if you can’t beat ’em, join ’em”, on a morning when my fellow travellers leave the resort and head off on an excursion, I decide to stay and spend the time having a swim in every single one of those 12 pools.

The property is on a large slope and the pools are on terraces that adjoin in a kind of cascade to the sea.

It’s about 9am, and it’s just me and the gardeners when I take my first dips in the two low-key pools down by the water’s edge, one of them with a bar – a great place for sundowners – accompanying it. At this time, the bar is closed, all is quiet and you can still watch the fishing boats returning from their night’s work.

It’s here I appreciate the fact that Alma Resort has absolute beachfront.

I’m soon swimming in an infinity-edged spectacular pool, 75 metres long and surrounded by lounges and shady huts. It’s got loungers in shallows with bubblers aerating the water. It’s even got waterfalls. I feel like I could stay all day but the “swimmin’ all the pools” mission beckons.

I head to another and I see one lifeguard hasten to get towels for a couple as they arrive and another help somebody blow up their floaty. That’s indicative of the service all over the resort. It is exemplary, despite the size of the place.

In another smaller pool it’s just me and a kid in a blue cap, matching rashie, reef shoes and full-face snorkel who gives me an outraged look as I hop into it with him. I reckon he usually has this little pool to himself, which is why he chooses it. But I tell him I really admire his spectacular snorkel and then I am his splish-splashing compadre.

At the next pool, as I reapply sunscreen, I realise that every pool terrace has toilets. That’s some thoughtful infrastructure.

I keep making my watery way up, until I’m at the foot of the towers and reach a kids’ pool into which I am not allowed. I decide to take a buggy to the waterpark, which is where, as I am floating around that lazy river, that Alma Resort makes sense to me. It simply does the big-resort thing brilliantly.

I would come back for the swimming pools alone but one of my favourite elements of the resort ends up being a wide open green space that catches breezes and where families fly kites in the afternoon. Against the backdrop of all the bells-and-whistles built environment, people still gravitate to this simple pleasure, just like me, and the simple pleasure of splashing about in a series of 12 swimming pools for no reason other than they are there.

Alma Resort is – let’s be honest – built for specific markets. The main nationalities here are Vietnamese and when pandemics and wars allow it, Chinese and Russian visitors.

But it also has much to recommend to Australian guests – it just takes me a day full of dips to realise it.

THE DETAILS

Fly

Jetstar flies three times a week from Sydney and four from Melbourne to Ho Chi Minh City. From there, you can fly domestically to Cam Ranh. The airport is only a 10-minute drive from the resort. See jetstar.com

Stay

From about $180 a night, see alma-resort.com.

The writer travelled as a guest of Jetstar and stayed as a guest of Alma Resort.