Tet in the best tourist village in the world

Tan Hoa in Minh Hoa district, Quang Binh province is one of 260 villages honored by the World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) as "The best tourist village in the world" in 2023 thanks to preserving and promoting traditional national cultural identity.

Travel in the flood zone

The village is located in a valley, surrounded by rocky mountains. Every year during the flood season, the water of the Rao Nan River rushes down like a raging waterfall. The water rises, turning Tan Hoa into a water bag. People only have time to bring a few belongings and then run to the rocky ledges for shelter. When they return, their houses are submerged in mud, their properties seem to have been lost. The historic flood in 2010, when the water level rose to 12 meters, submerged the entire village and since then, Tan Hoa has been known as the "flood center".

Tu Lan Cave Discovery Tour

In 2011, thinking of ways to live with the flood, people tied about 20 to 30 empty barrels together, fixed them with 4 stakes at the 4 corners to form floating houses. When the flood season came, the floating houses floated with the water, and people continued to live normally with the rain and floods.

The floating house of Mr. Truong Xuan Duong (60 years old, village 1 - Yen Tho) and other households in Tan Hoa is not only a flood-proof house but has been converted into a homestay room for tourists to rent with full amenities, adaptable to all weather conditions. Tourists immerse themselves in the lives of the people experiencing tourism during the rainy and flood season. From there, each household has an additional 7-10 million VND/month thanks to welcoming guests and providing accommodation services. Mr. Truong Thanh Duyen, Chairman of Tan Hoa Commune People's Committee, said that up to this point, the whole commune has nearly 620 floating houses, ensuring that 100% of households can adapt, be safe and live with floods. Tan Hoa people are proud to have forests, beautiful and famous caves. Here, there is also the indigenous culture of the Nguon people with folk songs about fish poisoning: "Why wait until the season of the snails, there is a male snail sitting on the tray", "When it rains, the water flows all around/If you don't take your socks (wife), who will stab you to eat?"

Beautiful scenery, unique cuisine

Tan Hoa village has more than 3,300 people, mainly Nguon people with unique language and cultural activities.

Floating houses in Tan Hoa become unique homestays

Nature has endowed Tan Hoa with unique scenery, including a system of caves hidden deep in the forest. Many beautiful caves with extremely magnificent stalactites such as Tu Lan, Tien cave, Chuot cave, Hung Ton ... have appeared in world travel magazines Lonely Planet, CNN Travel. The ironwood forest, peaceful village scenes with buffaloes bending down to graze, deep green corn fields or limestone ranges have become filming locations for many movies, notably the Hollywood blockbuster "Kong: Skull Island".

In the days leading up to Tet, Tan Hoa people are busy preparing traditional local delicacies to serve tourists. Among them, Com Boi and Mam Thinh are indispensable specialties during Tet, festivals and when entertaining distinguished guests.

Tan Hoa village scene

The ingredients used to make boi rice are corn, rice and cassava mixed together. After soaking the grains in boiling water for about 2-3 hours, people take them out and pound them into powder in a mortar. Then, they put the powder in the stove to cook for about 1 hour. When the boi rice is cooked, they take it down and put it in a mold to form into pieces to eat. This boi dish is eaten with male snails caught in streams and wild fish and sweet potato soup.

The Tan Hoa people's fish sauce is made from raw materials such as fish in streams and rivers such as carp, grass carp, perch... Mrs. Tran Thi Hoa (52 years old) has been making fish sauce for 30 years now. She revealed that she has prepared ingredients to make hundreds of rice cakes and many jars of fish sauce to serve tourists. "Through many generations of experience, with the "secrets" passed down from our ancestors, we have made delicious and rich fish sauce from freshwater fish that anyone who has ever enjoyed it will never forget. This Tet, I plan to make 100 jars of fish sauce to serve tourists. They can buy them as gifts, to eat with rice on cold days" - Mrs. Hoa said.

Explore the ironwood forest in Tan Hoa

Through many ups and downs, the rice and fish sauce dishes of Tan Hoa people today still retain their unique traditional flavor. Not only on rainy and flood days, in the family reunion meals on holidays, Tet, death anniversaries, etc. of Tan Hoa people, there is always rice and fish sauce dishes to show respect to grandparents and ancestors.

Chua Me Dat Company (Oxalis) is the unit that laid the foundation for Tan Hoa tourism in 2010 and is working with Quang Binh province to build a solid step-by-step development strategy for Tan Hoa. According to Mr. Nguyen Chau A, General Director of Oxalis, these attractive tours have helped Tan Hoa welcome more than 10,000 tourists in the first 10 months of 2023. On the occasion of Lunar New Year this year, Tan Hoa will plan to coordinate with Oxalis Company to organize sightseeing tours during Tet. In addition to beautiful villages and caves, it will promote the processing of local cultural cuisine to serve tourists when they return to Tan Hoa to "celebrate" Tet. In addition to the two main dishes mentioned above, there will be many other dishes with the flavor of the mountains and forests such as: honey, stream fish, stream snails, wild vegetables, yams... which are expected to attract tourists during Tet.

Mr. Nguyen Ngoc Quy, Director of the Quang Binh Provincial Department of Tourism, said that Tan Hoa tourist village will be gradually built into a model of weather-adaptive tourism in Vietnam and Southeast Asia. In addition to creating tourism products that adapt to weather conditions, this is also an effective model of connection between businesses and the community. Businesses support marketing and business while the community creates more sustainable value for mutual development, gradually perfecting and diversifying services in Tan Hoa to meet the diverse needs of tourists.

The tiger guards the ironwood forest

Mr. Truong Xuan Do (72 years old) is considered a "fierce tiger" protecting the ironwood forest. Although no one pays him any salary to protect the ironwood forest, he volunteers to protect it at all costs. Thanks to that, the ironwood forest behind his house is still intact with precious wood and has become a tour called "Discovering the ironwood forest - Kong's House" by 4-wheel off-road vehicle. This is an attractive tour for many tourists coming to Tan Hoa.

Source: https://nld.com.vn/tet-o-lang-du-lich-tot-nhat-the-gioi-196240206000505958.htm