Travelog - A travel guide to Vietnam

Orchids blossom in spring time in Sa Pa.

For a special spring time holiday destination, head to Tay Bac Highland, and especially Sa Pa. Visitors will be amazed by the orchids, which blossom at this time, the beauty of nature and the many festivals held in the area welcoming the Lunar New Year.

Even in the cold weather, the young tribal people of Sa Pa make visitors feel unforgettably warm with their radiant smiles. During spring time, the fragrance of flowers, the colours of ethnic fabric of H’mong, Dao or Thai women, and the sounds of flutes and the leaf-horn of the village’s young men and women leave a strong impression of Sa Pa on every visitor.

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In the King Tu Duc dynasty (the 19th century), Can Gio had deep and wide bays where trading boats used to travel in and out busily. In the Nguyen dynasty and French colonial time, Can Gio was a military post, controlling the sea surface of the former Gia Dinh citadel.

Since 1978, Can Gio has belonged to Ho Chi Minh City with the name Duyen Hai district which was renamed into Can Gio district in 1991.
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The highland market is always full of colours

From the primitive age, Tay Bac has been endowed with innumerable marvels by nature. Although many things have been discovered, this area still contains a lot of mysteries.

Going from Hanoi to Tay Bac (the northwestern area of Vietnam), visitors can follow Road 6 to Hoa Binh, Son La, Lai Chau and Dien Bien, and then turn to Lao Cai and Yen Bai by taking Road 3, which also leads to the starting point.

The gates to Tay Bac are Hoa Binh and Yen Bai where the mountains, hills and primal forests prevail. Ranges of high mountains stretch to the central region of the country and connect with the Truong Son Range which runs to the western area of the South. The mountains in Tay Bac are very high, seeming to touch the sky.

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Visiting the historical Tan Trao Banyan tree

The residents in Tuyen Quang Province are proud of their native land and its development. Over the past half a century, the province where people of 22 ethnic groups live together has experienced great socio-economic changes that brought a better life to the locals and changed the thinking and working habits of the authorities and people in the new period of time. Read the rest of this entry »

Bac Giang – the mid-land region well-known for cultural, historical and human beauties and traditional crafts – has seen big changes and developments over the years.

Land of farms and orchards

Luc Ngan litchi is famous for its sweet and tasty flavour

Not only the native land of peasant-turned hero De Tham, the historical Yen The District is also a concentration of cultural, historical and human beauties, and the origin of Thuong River that cuts through Bac Giang Province. Currently, areas well known for fruits like litchi-rich Luc Ngan and other perennial industrial crops are expanding to 45,000 ha together with fields yielding up to VND 50 million (over USD 3,000) per ha annually. Nearly 1,700 farms have mushroomed in the province, Read the rest of this entry »

Khmer girls performing a folk dance.

Soc Trang Province is a land bearing many imprints of reclaiming land and fighting against foreign aggressors by people of Kinh, Khmer and Hoa (Chinese) ethnic groups, who have always united together in good and bad times and are now joining their efforts to improve their socio-economic life and preserve their unique cultures.

Soc Trang Province People’s Committee President Huynh Thanh Hiep gave us a warm welcome when we met him. He told us about the bumper harvests, good prices for rice and the happiness of the people, especially the Khmer ethnic people. Talking about the last shrimp harvest, he said merrily: “There is a shrimp farm in Vinh Chau that harvested 22 tonnes of shrimp per ha, making it a record in Vietnam. Before the year 2000, one could hardly imagine of golden harvests on Soc Trang land.” President Hiep spoke so positively about the improvements that it inspired us to visit the whole province.

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Apart from Hoi An, Hanoi is Vietnam’s only city where ancient streets can be found. These streets still keep the same appearance that they had at the end of 19th century. According to historical sources, they have been the true core of Thang Long since its foundation about a thousand years ago.

The area occupied by these ancient streets forms a triangle with its top at Hang Than street and its base at the axis of Hang Bong - Hang Gai - Cau Go street, the eastern side being a section of the Red River Dyke and the eastern side being Hang Cot, Hang Dieu, and Hang Da streets.

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“Catching tortoises”,a traditional dance
of the Red Dao.

Over thousands of years of national construction and defence, the ethnic people along the northern border areas have created a rich and diverse cultural tradition, of which festivals are considered an important factor in their spiritual life with unique and distinctive features. One of them is “Seeking Fortune” feast by the Red Dao

The Red Dao in Ho Thau Commune, Hoang Su Phi District, Ha Giang Province holds a feast to seek fortune in the beginning of the year, from the first to the 15th day of lunar January.

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Do people call it physical and non-physical culture? Whether they think of it this way or dream of it another way, they have to recognize it when staying in the heart of the ancient town of Hoi An, day and night.

In the late afternoon, Hoi An brightens with a golden sunshine. As an old seaport, just like so many other harbours in the world, Hoi An always becomes animated in the afternoon, which is the transition from day to night, and the harmony between the mainland and the sea, between reality and imagination.

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The Vietnam Airlines airplane was descending to Tan Son Nhat international airport. A bird’s-eye view of Saigon (now Ho Chi Minh City ), for long described as the pearl of the Orient, reveals a sparkling city that promotes the eagerness among visitors to explore it.In Saigon , there are only two seasons, the dry and the rainy. It is neither too hot nor too cold in the City, a light coat would be enough to ward off the cold during the coldest days; that is why visitors can come to Saigon at any time in the year.

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