TRIP N°1 :

BETWEEN 3000M-HIGH ROCKY PEAKS AND CARDAMOM FORESTS: THE LAND OF THE HANI, THE GIAY, THE HMONG AND THE DAO

2-day /1-night trip :
Sa Pa - Ban Xéo – Muong Vi - Muong Hum – Y Ty – A Lu – A Muc Sung – Coc My – Lao Cai – Sa Pa

Day 1: Leaving from Sa Pa: Ban Xéo – visit of Muong Vi cave, night in basic guesthouse in Muong Hum (Mường Hum has only had electricity for a year).

Day 2: Muong Hum, visit of the San Ma Sao cardamom forest – Den Sang, visit of the Hani villages on Y Ty plateau, visit of waterfalls at Sino-Vietnamese border, A Muc Sung hot springs. Back to Sa Pa.

Muong Hum:
- Sunday market: every Sunday from 6 a.m. to 1 p.m.
This market, the biggest cardamom market in the area, was already there during the French colonial period and serves as a meeting place for the ethnic groups living in the mountains: Giay, Dao, White Hmong, Hani. Those living in the highlands, like the Hmong and the Zao (Dao) come down to sell their specific products such as cardamom and other spices and mountain plants.
In Mường Hum, you should taste the paddy rice brandy (made with unhusked rice) from the dao village of San Lung. Its fruity flavour and mildness have made it famous well beyond the limits of the Lào Cai province.

Activities in Muong Vi:
- Visit of the Muong Vi cave. This cave is still rarely visited, but the 1-to-2-hour trip along an underground river allows one to discover the natural sculptures created by water and minerals deposited over thousands of years. This is a pleasant place for a cool break between the town of Lào Cai and the Mường Hum ethnic market (bring sandals to walk in the cool water). The Muong Vi cave has been open to the public since the beginning of 2003 and is listed as one of « Vietnam’s natural heritage monuments ». During the rain season, (June-August), access is forbidden if the underground river water level is too high.
How to get there: The village of Muong Vi is located at about 30km from Lao Cai on the road to Mường Hum.

The Y Ty plateau:
Hani villages and Dan Sang and Y Ty cardamom protected forest. Over a century ago, the French military keeping watch on the Chinese border praised the beauty of the Y Ty plateau, 2000m-high and therefore 400m higher than Sa Pa. They enjoyed its cool climate and the charming Hani women who, they said, looked like gypsy women. There are only a few thousand Hani left, less than 10 villages, the majority of whom live in China. Hani houses are made of thick adobe walls with small openings and thatched roofs. A few kilometres before the village of Y Ty, the road goes through a big forest producing cardamom. This spice, is highly prized by the Chinese, and has become over the last ten years the mountain minoritie's most important source of income.

source from www.sapa-tourism.com