Tay Nguyen beauty in full bloom

With its vast coffee orchards, ruou can (fermented rice wine drunk out of a jar using pipes), and gong culture, the Tay Nguyen (Central Highlands) is an attractive tourism destination, especially at this time when the coffee trees are in full bloom.

Dak Lak Province's Buon Ma Thuot City, known as the coffee capital, is now covered in the white of coffee flowers. Don village and the palace of King Bao Dai – Viet Nam's last monarch – are other popular destinations in Dak Lak. The palace is now a museum of ethnic groups in Dak Lak.

At Don, tourists can take an elephant ride or explore the Serepok River by boat. A 115-year-old stilt house and the tomb of the "King of elephant hunters", Ama Kong, are the village's popular tourism destinations.

The region also attracts tourists to its many beautiful waterfalls, including Yaly in Kon Tum Province, Dieu Thanh in Dak Nong Province, and Krong Kmar in Dak Lak.

Quang Ninh aims at int’l tourism hub status

The northern coastal province of Quang Ninh is aiming to become an international tourism hub able to compete with foreign hotspots.

The target was set in a recently approved master plan on the province’s tourism development to 2020 with a vision to 2030.

Accordingly, Quang Ninh aims to rake in annual tourism revenue of 1.5 billion USD, along with 7.4 million foreign tourist arrivals and 8 million domestic visitors every year by 2020.

Tourism earnings are set to account for 10 percent of the local gross domestic product, twice the current figure, over the period.

Quang Ninh is home to Ha Long Bay, a world heritage site, and Yen Tu Buddhist centre, among other popular destinations for visitors.

In 2013, the province served 7.5 million holidaymakers, a year-on-year rise of 7 percent, and earned 5 trillion VND (235 million USD) from this sector.

Tourists to Danang increase sharply

Danang city has recorded a sharp increase in the number of international arrivals in the first quarter of 2014, up as much as 10-20%, according to travel agents Vitours, Vietravel and Saigontourist.

Liberation Day (March 29) saw an especially marked increase.

At present, Asian tourists, especially Chinese visitors are flocking to the city in large delegations of 800-1,000 people. The most attractive tourist destinations are the central provinces of Quang Nam, Hue and Quang Binh and Da Nang-Hoi An.

Tourism experts attribute the increase to Da Nang city’s selection by Smart Travel Asia – Asia’s most prestigious online tourism magazine – as  an Asian top ten destination in 2013.

Agoda.com – a famous e-booking website in Asia – promulgates that Da Nang has posted a fast economic growth rate, with the increasing number of new hotels and trade centres the feature attraction.

The region touts ten new tourism destinations in 2014 include Mandalay (Myanmar), Kenting (Taiwan), Okinawa (Japan), Lombok (Indonesia), Kaohsiung (Taiwan), Kota Kinabalu (Malaysia), Osaka (Japan), Chiang Rai (Thailand), Perth (Australia) and Danang (Vietnam).

ANA launches Hanoi-Haneda air route

An All Nippon Airways of Japan (ANA) plane landed at Hanoi’s Noi Bai International Airport on March 30, kick-starting a weekly direct air route between Hanoi and Haneda (Tokyo).

The plane NH857, departing from Haneda at 08.45am and arriving in Hanoi at 11.55am, brought 208 passengers to Hanoi.   

The return flight coded NH858 left Hanoi for Haneda at 02.00pm with 180 passengers on board.

This is the second air route ANA has opened in Vietnam, after the Hanoi-Narita (Tokyo) route launched in 2001.

The new air route aims to expand ANA’s flight network between Vietnam and Japan, said ANA Vietnam Director Ryoichi Fujisaki.

JAL opens HCM City-Tokyo route

The Civil Aviation Authority of Viet Nam has allowed Japan Airlines (JAL) to start non-stop flights between Tokyo's Haneda International Airport and HCM City's Tan Son Nhat International Airport.

JAL will begin a daily return trip from March 30. It will continue to operate its daily return flights between Narita International Airport and the Tan Son Nhat International Airport as well as Ha Noi's Noi Bai International Airport.

Phu Yen to focus on natural charms

Phu Yen will focus on developing tours that take in both its marine and mountain attractions this year, according to the central province's Tourism Association.

Its most popular attractions include Da Dia stone reef, Bai Mon beach – Mui Dien cape, Bai Xep beach, Vung Ro bay, and Chop Chai Mountain.

Phu Yen can count among its advantages the facts that its sightseeing sites allow free entry and that local food is delicious and inexpensive.

It hopes to attract about 750,000 tourists this year, including 77,000 foreigners. The number was around 600,000 tourists last year.

The Tay Nguyen (Central Highlands) province of Kon Tum has set up Pa Sy Waterfall Tourism Area, an ecological and community-based tourism destination in Kon Tu Rang Village, Kon Plong District.

The 25ha area has attractions like waterfalls and lakes set in vast pine forests and scores of rustic wooden statues created by dozens of local ethnic artisans.

It also has vegetable and flower farms, and visitors can see Mo Nam ethnic minority artists living in Kon Tu Rang make handicrafts.

11th century monkcelebrated

The Thay Pagoda festival to honour Buddhism master Tu Dao Hanh (1072-1116) will be held from April 4 to 6 in Sai Son commune in Ha Noi's Quoc Oai District.

Hanh, who led a religious life and died in the pagoda, is remembered for his contribution to treating diseases and creating folk games and arts including water puppetry.

Besides rituals, the festival will also have events like wrestling and water puppetry, with the latter being performed at Thuy Dinh House in a pond in front of the pagoda.

The festival is held every year from the fifth to seventh days of the third lunar month.

Located at the foot of Sai Son Mountain, Thay Pagoda, a national heritage site, also boasts beautiful landscapes besides its historical attractions.

Ha Giang plans cave tourism

The northern border province of Ha Giang plans to develop Dan Pioong cave in Vi Xuyen District's Bach Ngoc commune into a tourism site.

The cave, conferred the status of a national heritage site this month, has beautiful stalactites, pools of water, and waterfalls.

Its exquisite beauty and geographic location make the cave an attractive destination for local and foreign tourists, especially adventurous ones.

The province will build a 2km asphalt road from the commune to the cave and take steps to protect the environment around the cave, Luong Van Doan, chairman of the Vi Xuyen People's Committee, said.

The number of foreign tourists coming to Phu Quoc island in Kien Giang province in the first quarter of this year is 33 percent higher than that of the same period last year which recorded 57,100 arrivals.

According to statistics released by the provincial Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism, Kien Giang welcomed over 913,000 tourists in the first three months of the year, a year-on-year drop of 12.5 percent.

The downward trend is believed to result from unexciting tourism products provided at high prices and poor facilities.

Last year, the province received more than 5.23 million tourists, a year-on-year decrease of 2.1 percent. As for Phu Quoc, the district attracted nearly 622,500 visitors, up 25.2 percent from 2012, including around 122,800 foreign arrivals.

Phu Quoc, Vietnam’s largest island, has been endowed with wild and natural beauty. In 2004, the 574sq.km heart-shaped island was approved by the Government to develop into a tourism centre of regional and international stature.

The island’s Dai (Long) Beach has been continuously placed among ‘The Cleanest and Most Beautiful Beaches of the World’ by ABC News since the start of 2008.

With lush green foliage and tropical flowers and the natural resources of both jungle and sea, the Phu Quoc National Park on the island is a part of the Kien Giang biosphere reserve, which was recognised as a World Biosphere Reserve by UNESCO in 2006.-

Thua-Thien Hue attracts 650,000 tourists in Q1

According to the Thua Thien - Hue Deparment of Culture, Sports and Tourism, in the first quarter of 2014, the province attracted 650,662 tourist arrivals, increasing by 2.3 percent over the same period last year.

Of this, foreign arrivals were 271,365, increasing by 2.1 percent; domestic 379,397 and 2 percent, and over-night 397,603.

Those tourists spent more than 621 billion VND (29 millionUSD), up 5 percent over the same period last year.

The province plans to receive from 2.8 to 3 million arrivals this year, of which foreign tourists will be from 1.2 to 1.3 million, domestic 1.7 to 1.8 million, and over-night 2 million. It also hopes to get a revenue of 2.8 – 2.9 trillion VND, up 16 to 18 percent over the same period last year.

The central province is a major centre for tourism and festivals. It also houses Hue , the capital of the last feudal dynasty in Vietnam , the Nguyen.

Dien Bien develops ethnic cultural hamlets for tourism

The northwestern mountainous province of Dien Bien will expand the model of building cultural hamlets to develop its tourism following a successful pilot in a Thai ethnic hamlet, according to radio The Voice of Vietnam (VOV).

Together with 20 other hamlets across Vietnam, Che Can hamlet in Dien Bien district was selected in 2009 for a project to preserve Vietnam’s traditional cultures.

Che Can was given 450,000 USD to restore the local Thai people’s traditional houses, festivals, musical instruments, and brocade weaving.

"Thanks to an investment in 2010 from Dien Bien district's Division of Culture to develop brocade and rattan weaving, we have set up weaving groups with up to six people and an artisan in each group," head of Che Can hamlet Ca Van Oi told VOV.

Brocade weaving classes have been organised every year, he said, adding that the products are displayed in traditional houses as souvenir.

Members of the weaving groups in Che Can are now skilled enough that they are able to complete complicated brocade products such as Pieu scarves, bags, blankets, and mattress covers.

Women in the hamet now often practice brocade weaving when farm work slows and have become more aware of the importance of preserving their traditional craft of brocade weaving.

Villager Lo Thi Chung said: "Our craft would have fallen into oblivion without this effort and our children would have no memory of it someday. We have done a lot to promote the weaving craft by introducing it to both local people and visitors. This trade has raised our incomes and helps us pay for our children’s education."

The model of developing cultural hamlets for tourism has proved to be a good solution for new rural development in Muong Phang commune, too.

Secretary of the Muong Phang Party Committee Lo Van Bien said: “We are trying to develop the local economy by growing fruit trees, developing the craft of brocade weaving, and creating our own tourist products for visitors. For example, we’ve organised cultural exchanges to introduce our history and our unique cultural identity to visitors through brocade weaving and the local cuisine."

Dien Bien province has applied this model in eight other hamlets, in which art troupes have been established to entertain visitors, promote the local culture and arts, and generate more income for local residents. The hamlets are being helped to develop the model of community-based tourism.

To attract more visitors, local people have altered their habits to preserve a green, clean environment.

Lo Van Un, chief of Ten hamlet in Dien Bien district, said that they understand the goal of building a cultural hamlet and are now more aware of preserving their unique culture and actively participating in local cultural and art movements. Local authorities have paid a lot of attention to persuading people to maintain a green, clean environment and encouraging them to donate land for new roads.

Dien Bien province has approved a project to build cultural hamlets to develop provincial tourism by 2015.

In addition to the eight Thai hamlets, 10 hamlets of the H'Mong, Kho Mu and Ha Nhi minority people will also receive funds to develop this new model of cultural tourism.

Home to 21 ethnic minority group, Dien Bien province has long been a popular tourist destination with many historical places closely associated with the 1954 Dien Bien Phu victory.-