Sa Pa crowded with tourists in New Year’s first days hinh anh 1A terraced rice field in Sa Pa (Photo: VNA)

Lao Cai (VNA) – Sa Pa town in the northern province of Lao Cai welcomed about 35,000 visitors in the three-day calendar New Year holiday, a slight rise over the same time in 2016.

According to Vice Chairman of the Sa Pa district People’s Committee Nguyen Ngoc Hinh, the visitors, mostly from southern and central regions, enjoyed the romantic space of the “cloudy town”, with a temperature of around 7 degrees Celsius.

To deal with the overload in accommodation, this year, Sa Pa has developed homestay tourism, which allows tourists to experience daily activities of locals and explore their culture and customs, he said.

He said that the district has also focused on expanding eco-tourism tours to a number of areas, including Thanh Phu, Nam Sai and Thanh Kim which are home to many ethnic minority groups.

In the first days of 2017, the locality also held a number of cultural and art events to attract visitors, while deploying forces to ensure traffic safety and security, Hinh added.

Located at 1,600 metres above the sea level in Vietnam’s northwest mountains, Sa Pa is a picturesque town famous for its fine, rugged scenery and the cultural diversity of many ethnic minority groups.

Home to many hill tribes, rice terraces, lush vegetation and Fansipan, which is dubbed as the roof of Indochina, Sa Pa has become an ideal destination for domestic and foreign travellers./.
VNA