Trekfansipan.com

Temperatures in Sapa, the most famous tourist site of northern Vietnam, are less than 4oC, but the town is very crowded with foreign and local visitors who come to celebrate Christmas. VietNamNet reports in photos:

Despite the cold spell, ethnic minority girls still travel to town from their far-away villages.

The cold doesn’t stop visitors.

All hotels decorate their entrances to welcome Christmas.

Hoang Manh Dung, Director of the Sapa Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism, told VietNamNet that the number of foreign visitors for Christmas has risen sharply in 2009.

The town’s church in fog.

Source: PV/VNN

Recommendation for Trekking Fansipan , Vietnam:
Sapa Travel Guide
Trekking Travel Guide
Trek Fansipan Tours

Bac Ha fair opens every Sunday in Bac Ha district, the northern mountainous province of Lao Cai. The fair is known for its cultural identity of ethnic minority people.

The fair attracts not only domestic tourists but also many foreigners who come to look for colourful brocade, skirts of Mong ethnic minority people and specialities of the mountain region.

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Editor’s Note: This is the second installment focusing of Cheryn’s travels in Vietnam. Be sure to read Cheryn’s other blog post about Hanoi’s old quarter.

Sapa field, Vietnam

We arrived at the train station in the city of Lao Cai and boarded a bus to Sapa. An hour later, the landscape changed from flat to mountainous and the views became dramatic, with terraced rice paddies trickling water from one to another and colorful hill tribe people on the side of the road, carrying baskets of leaves on their backs or selling veggies and fruit from roadside stalls.

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I still can’t believe I did it (because everyone said the weather was too bad) but I did, I climbed Mt Fansipan… and when I say climbed, I seriously do mean CLIMBED because it certainly wasn’t like any other walk I have ever done!

It’s supposed to be the highest peak in Indochina at a height of 3143m and to get to the top usually takes 3 days, unless you are in incredibly good shape, lacking time and want to put yourself through hell and do it all in 2 days. So I thought I’d do it in 3 - on the first day this involved hiking to a base camp at 2000m, the second day was the ascent to the summit - going straight up 1000m - and the third day was easier, just involving hiking out of the jungle.

So from my first day in Sapa I was looking out for people to do the trip with me, which was harder than I expected. Sapa is a really beautiful town which feels just like the Alps, it is really relaxing, and I guess most travellers aren’t on holiday, especially during the rainy season, wanting to do a really tough climb! But I met an Israeli guy (Raz) who had just spent 4.5 years in the army who was interested in the climb, and then the next day we met Selyf (from Wales), who had climbed many mountains in the UK, so we booked the trek together. We did meet a few people who had come back, some having been turned back due to the bad weather, and no one was recommending the trip, everyone was saying it was too tough!!

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Through the unsettling cloudy haze, I saw an alignment of charred trees and was grateful for the greener more vibrant vegetation near our base camp.  My leg was wounded but not seriously, so I could still walk, despite the throbbing pain emanating from both of my callused feet. 

The four of us all sat quietly resting after hours of a non-stop hiking up the side of Fansipan mountain.  It was too late to turn back now – and we had already come halfway and were determined to finish what we had started.

Eoin, Brennan, Suzanna and I gazed curiously at the black scalded war-torn trees in front of us. After the guys dealed another round of cards, Suzanna finally had the courage to speak up and directed a question toward our Vietnamese guides, “Are the trees from… the war?”

We expecting a somewhat sorrowful response from them, but instead, the guides all looked at one another; said something in Vietnamese, and then started to chuckle at her remark.

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Sunday 10th December 1995

I’d spent seven days in Sapa and each had been cold, wet and foggy. This morning brought thick fog again and my spirits dropped. I’d been told that today the weather would change and we’d set off for the summit of Fansipan. Two days ago a party had tried to make the trip and failed as a result of the poor weather and I knew that without the sun we’d never make it to the top.

The small town of Sapa, built by the French at 3,000 feet and perched on the side of the valley facing Vietnam’s highest mountain ridge, gets pretty cold and damp at the end of the rainy season. Then, in December the winds change and the skies clear for about a month before they veer round again and bring bitterly cold weather and snow from the north. Just my luck that the rainy season finished late this year.

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