Mai Chau

For our first trip out from Hanoi, we headed west into the mountains. The hill tribes in this part of the country are not ethnically Vietnamese, but are related to other tribes throughout southeast Asia. We stayed near Mai Chau, in a White Thai (referring to their clothing) stilt house. It was good to get out of the city and experience rural life. Near the town of Mai Chau, the Vietnamese government designated a few villages to be tourist villages. This lets the tribes make the tourist bucks, as well as allowing for the remaining villages to retain their non-tourist character. Our village was Pom Coong.

Ma River Excursion

After arriving in Pom Coong, we ate lunch, took a bit of a nap, then got back in the minivan and drove to the boat. We took a small boat up the Ma (Horse) River. Passing the people who live on the river, the boat carried us upriver to a small village -- inaccesable by land. The people were quite friendy and the village charming. We returned as the sun was going down.

Trekking to Hang Kia

The second day we went trekking (hiking) to the remote village of Hang Kia. It's a H'mong village (another ethnic group) so we needed a White Thai guide (Twee) to translate H'mong for our Vietnamese guide (Diep) to translate to us in English (got all that?) The unusual landscape with the different cultures made this hike very wirthwhile.

We didn't go too far afield with this excursion -- there are trips to more remote parts of Vietnam with wilder landscape. But with time being a limited resource, our 3 day, 2 night trip gave us a good feel to the unique life & culture of rural Vietnam.