In order to build connecting tours and tourist destinations throughout the province, especially connecting Quynh Nhai and Thuan Chau districts with other districts in the province and with other provinces, from December 25-27, the Son La Provincial Investment, Trade and Tourism Promotion Center, the Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism; the Provincial Tourism Association in coordination with the UNESCO Hanoi Travel Club organized the Famtrip Program to promote, survey, introduce destinations, and connect tours and tourist routes in the two districts of Quynh Nhai and Thuan Chau.

The Famtrip delegation surveyed a number of destinations, connecting tours and tourist routes in Thuan Chau and Quynh Nhai districts, Son La province. Photo by Phuong Cuc

Along with the goal of connecting tourist areas, tourist areas and destinations, creating balance and equilibrium between regions, in 2024, Son La decided to choose Quynh Nhai and Thuan Chau districts to invite experts, travel agencies, and media agencies to survey, to frankly contribute opinions to help localities clearly see the current picture of tourism products, tourist areas, and destinations to have fundamental solutions to remove difficulties to attract more and more tourists and orient the construction of the tourism planning of Son La hydroelectric reservoir into a national tourist area soon to come true.

After 2 days, the delegation surveyed and experienced many places such as offering incense, visiting and introducing President Ho Chi Minh Memorial House, Thuan Chau Flag Tower Relic; Binh Thuan farm; Burning incense at the Martyrs' Temple at Pha Din Pass Historical - Cultural Area, surveying some tourist areas and OCOP product display areas at Pha Din Pass, Thuan Chau district and Song Da lake area (Uy Phong Bay, Binh Yen Bay, Trai Tim Island, fish cage farming area on Song Da lake...) in Quynh Nhai district.

Within the framework of the program, to listen to the opinions and share experiences of researchers, tourism experts, travel agencies, and tourism service businesses to build tourism products and tourist destinations in the two districts of Thuan Chau and Quynh Nhai, the Center for Investment, Trade and Tourism Promotion of Son La province organized a seminar on Building products, routes, and tourist destinations in the districts of Thuan Chau and Quynh Nhai on December 27.

Sharing at the discussion, representatives of many travel agencies contributed ideas for tourism in Quynh Nhai and Thuan Chau districts. Dr. Tran Thi Ngan Giang, Deputy General Director of the Joint Stock Company for Technology Application Transfer and Sustainable Community Tourism Development (TTSC) commented: After two days of Famtrip, we saw some weak points in tourism here. On the roads, we saw a lot of plastic waste, so the locality needs to propagate to the people to be aware of cleaning the environment. Passing through the Mong and Thai villages, there were many brick houses, many people wearing Kinh costumes.

Mr. Nguyen Viet Dung - Director of Hitech Tourism Construction Joint Stock Company - said that Son La has a long-standing famous tourist area, which is Moc Chau. But now, Moc Chau is only considered the first destination of tours to the Northwest along National Highway 6. Therefore, developing tourism in Thuan Chau and Quynh Nhai is very much in the right direction. The Son La Hydropower Reservoir is a gem, the prospect will be even higher than Moc Chau.

However, Mr. Dung said,

It is necessary to honor the identity of the Thai people as a "compass" for tourism development. Service points need to be built on stilts, not reinforced concrete hotels and multi-storey buildings like we are seeing. Because the strength here is nature, it is important to beautify the natural identity here.

Mr. Phan Thanh Tung, Director of Vietnam Travel Joint Stock Company, said that currently, tourists are very interested in carbon credits and emission reduction in tourism activities. Therefore, it is necessary to limit the import of iron, steel, bricks and tiles into this natural area.

Mr. Tung suggested: Every person here can do communication and marketing for their village. Therefore, we should organize training courses on filming clips, making youtube, tik tok for people in the villages here. Don't just say: Quynh Nhai is very beautiful, tourists should come!. But we must provide tourists with what they need, what they like, not what we have.

Phuong Cuc - Ngoc Hoa