Thousand-dollar tourists stop in Quang Nam

S-Journey train passengers explore the countryside of Quang Nam. Photo: CAM PHO

Quang Nam Newspaper had an interview with Mr. Le Hoang Ha - Director of Hoi An Unique Tourism Service Company Limited (Hoi An Unique), the unit chosen to welcome guests from the 5-star S-Jouney ship.

Quang Nam - a special stop

*Why is Unique, although little known, chosen to pick up passengers from the S-Journey train?

I have worked in the tourism industry for decades, and have had contact with and a large network of colleagues in the high-end customer segment. Not long ago, a group of colleagues who had worked with me for many years in Hanoi established a company and invested in a North-South tourist train system focusing on exploiting high-end customers.

These people understood my abilities and recognized the difference, so they asked me to become a partner in Quang Nam to pick up and drop off tourists from train tours to visit Quang Nam destinations.

*Can you tell us more about the cruise ship that your company is welcoming to visit Quang Nam?

This train runs from North to South on the railway track of Vietnam Railway Corporation. The journey lasts 8 days and 7 nights, the current selling price per passenger is 8,360 USD, equivalent to about 220 million VND. The passengers are mainly foreigners.

There are only about 30 such ships in the world, concentrated in Europe and the US. Customers are selected from high-end markets to come to Vietnam to experience.

Quang Nam is one of the stops identified as the highlight of the train journey. On average, Tra Kieu station has one group visiting each month.

The train runs from Hanoi to Ninh Binh and stops for a day. After visiting here, the train will go to Quang Binh, then Quang Nam. We pick up guests at Tra Kieu station in the morning. From here, guests are taken on a sightseeing tour and in the evening, guests must be dropped off at the scheduled time to board the next journey. Guests always sleep on the train.

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From countryside to city

We pick up guests at Tra Kieu station, then guests go to Au Lac cultural tourist attraction. Here, visitors will listen to wood carving artisans tell stories through handicraft products depicting Quang culture throughout the journey from Ngoc Linh mountain range to the lower Thu Bon river. After this tourist attraction, guests continue to ride a jeep through the villages. This is also a different highlight, when in Ninh Binh we pick up guests by bicycle, in Hue we take a vespa, in Nha Trang we pick up guests by boat...

Each locality has its own characteristics to create its own impression. The next stop is Thanh Ha Pottery Village. At noon, visitors will stop for lunch at a special restaurant located in a local's house in Cam Thanh commune. This meal is cooked by the locals themselves, visitors do not know the menu, the market goers also cook the same way as serving their own family. The final destination of the journey is visitors stop at Hoai River to release flower lanterns with wishes...

(Mr. Le Hoang Ha)

*Why is Quang Nam on the list of S-Journey stops?

Quang Nam is a special stop and highlight of the journey to discover Vietnam on the S-Journey. For tourists, Quang Nam is a special destination, not only known for the world cultural heritages of Hoi An and My Son but also as a culturally rich tourist space.

Tourists experience craft villages in Quang Nam. Photo: CAM PHO

Since April 2024, before S-Journey runs, the team has surveyed the stops from North to South. In Quang Nam, the group announced that the train is expected to stop at 9am and return at 6pm. At that time, the reception unit must come up with an attractive schedule to encapsulate the most typical images of Quang Nam for guests to experience.

From this topic, we have planned and suggested that the train should stop at Tra Kieu because the station has a system of 3 independent rails, ensuring the train stays for a long time.

In Tra Kieu, tourists can also easily go to rural areas that have been little exploited for a long time, such as Go Noi, Duy Xuyen... These are suitable places for rural agricultural tourism.

The true value of cultural and ecological tourism

*After the reception, what feedback did guests have about the Quang Nam stopover?

We are very happy that our direction is on the right track, promoting the image of high-value tourism in Quang Nam while creating excitement for visitors. Everyone highly appreciates the organization and arrangement of the products.

According to customer feedback, in the journey of thousands of kilometers across Vietnam, the stopover in Quang Nam is the place that leaves the most emotions.

*From the story of Unique Travel, it shows that the foundation for community and heritage tourism in Quang Nam is almost ready. The remaining task is to attract visitors?

That's right. Currently, Quang Nam has a lot of cultural and natural resources. The most important thing is the mindset of tourism workers to connect the subjects into a systematic, logical and professional layer. To welcome this tour, I myself had to go to training courses at least 5 times...

Homemeal lunch at a local's house in Hoi An organized by Unique Company. Photo: CAM PHO

* But if it is as simple as the tour you mentioned, it will be similar to other products. Instead of going by train, customers who choose to go by road will have a similar experience and will not have to spend thousands of dollars?

Currently, in the Hoi An train stop tour, partners sign a contract to serve train passengers exclusively for at least 5 years. Each stop on the journey will also have special services that are guaranteed to be different and more attractive than other groups of guests. We guarantee exclusive and unique exploitation for a certain period of time.

The products we sell to train passengers are not sold anywhere else. The highlight of the S-Journey train's stopover in Quang Nam is the home meal. Guests are cooked by the host as if serving relatives, and have an exclusive experience with unique products that are guaranteed to be "none".

*The subject of the Quang Nam discovery tour is the countryside, craft villages, and rural landscape. So what benefits does the community get?

The different way of thinking when organizing this tour with us is not to calculate the actual cost and then add our profit to the bill for customers. The products highlight the invisible value of the cultural ecology of the village so that customers can be welcomed. From there, they are willing to pay reasonable costs, the invisible value from the village, the things that cannot be seen must be greater than the actual costs.

It is not easy to have an ecological space, it is not easy to have a cultural depth for guests to experience like the way to run a restaurant or cook a meal. Cultural experience tourism, ecological tourism must be worthy of being paid the right value and stature.

Source: https://baoquangnam.vn/khach-nghin-do-dung-chan-xu-quang-3151853.html