Like most visitors, we came to Ta Xua - known as "Heaven on Earth of Son La" - from Moc Chau. This is considered the shortest route, only 100km away; from Son La town to Ta Xua is 115km and from Hanoi is 240km away. private tours to Vietnam
From Bac Yen, passing through a winding and dangerous road, only seeing a few small villages of the H'Mong people nestled on the mountainside, we arrived at Ta Xua in the cool weather. Before our eyes was a bustling urban area with all kinds of shops, motels, tourist services, cloud hunting facilities... looking like a part of Sa Pa, or a miniature town in an European country. We were all surprised at the rapid change of a highland that was just a deserted H'Mong village 5 years ago, but is now a colorful tourist town.
Ta Xua is at the end of the cloud hunting season (from October to March of the following year), but tourists and backpackers are still bustling and accommodation establishments, restaurants, cafes... are busy with construction. Unlike Sa Pa, which has many family tourists, Ta Xua is almost exclusively young visitors. The signs of the shops are all associated with clouds, both in Vietnamese and English. Funny enough, there is a restaurant named Chi Bau, related to a backpacker anecdote. The story goes that once a group of backpackers went to the highlands and saw a beautiful flower growing wildly on the mountainside, so they asked a H'Mong man who was herding horses nearby. The ethnic minority guy replied: "chi bau"! (in Mong language it means... "don't know"). Thinking that this was the name of a beautiful and strange flower, the backpacker group happily posted online the image of the newly discovered chi bau flower. Many people flocked to take pictures of the strange flower and it turned out that "chi bau" was not the name of this flower.
Ta Xua’s development potential and tourism appeal are still huge. This highland region has advantages that no other place has.
Located in a primeval forest of 17,650 hectares on the southeastern slope of the Hoang Lien Son range, the terrain is strongly divided, forming many high peaks along the Phu Sa Phin range; of which Ta Xua peak is one of the 15 highest peaks in Vietnam and is a place that is very popular with mountaineering enthusiasts. Many mountain climbing awards have been held here. Quite uniquely, Ta Xua peak is not a single peak but is composed of 3 peaks. Of which, the highest peak of 2,850m is where the Vietnamese flagpole is erected, with a stainless steel top; the second peak still has a flagpole erected by the French; the third peak is lower, located in the middle.
In particular, Ta Xua is also chosen as one of the three “cloud paradises” in the Northwest region, including Lao Than peak and Bach Moc Luong Tu peak in Lao Cai, but Ta Xua is more popular with cloud hunters. Besides, camping and trekking in the forest in Ta Xua are also very interesting. In this primeval forest located in the highlands, there is a very mysterious vegetation with “ancient moss forests” with magical shapes and landscapes.
In addition to Pu Ta Leng, Pusilung (Lai Chau) and Fanxipan (Lao Cai) known as the "kingdom of rhododendron flowers", recently, Ta Xua primeval forest has also been discovered as a place with ancient rhododendron flowers of all colors blooming in February and March, captivating art photographers and flower lovers.
So, checking in Ta Xua along with cloud hunting, you can also climb mountains, trek to see moss and ancient rhododendrons, camp amidst majestic landscapes, fresh air.
Experience the thrill
Backpackers and mountain climbers all agree that conquering Ta Xua peak is never easy, because the terrain of this mountain is complex with steep, undulating, long stretches, and extremely winding climbing routes... But the biggest challenge in the Ta Xua climbing route is... the dinosaur's spine. This is the third peak located among the three peaks of the Pu Sa Phin range, commonly known as Ta Xua. This climbing section is narrow on steep rocky terrain, with deep abysses on both sides. One of the most dangerous but also attractive climbing routes for adventure lovers. Experienced tourist guides here all advise people with a fear of heights or weak hearts... not to take the risk.
The car carrying a group of people into Hang Dong commune just stopped when dozens of Mong youths on motorbikes rushed to offer their services. From the commune center to Chong Tra village, where the 2,500m high mountain range looks like the back of a giant sleeping dinosaur, about 5km away, of which the "back" section is 3km long, said to be a trail, thin as a knife's edge, and when you walk on it, you feel like you are walking on a precarious wall, with deep abysses on both sides.
Although in 2019, to ensure the safety of tourists, the local authorities and people had erected iron stakes and stretched steel wires in difficult climbing sections, sitting on a motorbike hugging a H'Mong boy in first gear while climbing uphill through these sections, my heart skipped a beat and my whole body turned cold every time the two motorbikes kept the same speed and ran in opposite directions to avoid each other; if the wheels deviated by just 10cm, the motorbike would fly into the abyss, and both the person and the motorbike would be lost. There was a section, about 500m long, I had to walk, I had to crawl step by step; my body was sweating, just one careless step and I would fall into the abyss that awaited both sides.
Returning safely to Hang Dong, we breathed a sigh of relief and praised the motorbike taxi drivers here for being as good as circus performers. The “driver” who took me to the dinosaur’s back was Mua A Trung, a second-year student at the Faculty of Natural Resources and Environment at Son La University. He said that there were more than 50 motorbike taxi drivers here, all of whom were H'Mong youth, and were most active during weekends and tourist seasons. Trung took advantage of his days off from school to drive a motorbike taxi to earn money, taking 2-3 trips a day. Each round trip was 60,000 VND.
Source: A memorable adventure to Ta Xua
No comments:
Post a Comment