“Thuy Bieu in the morning – Tam Giang in the afternoon” is a new tour in Hue for visitors to explore fresh green thanh tra pomelo villages in the city, with the characteristic ancient beam houses and immerse themselves in the largest lagoon system in Southeast Asia.
Visitors are experiencing net fishing on the lagoon
Experiencing indigenous life
Huetourist Company launched the community travel tour named “Thuy Bieu in the morning – Tam Giang in the afternoon” in early October 2017. This is a distinctive experience tour compared to the previously-exploited tours to Thuy Bieu and Tam Giang lagoon, which is very suitable for group travel to experience local life at the destinations and highly interactive with indigenous people. The tours are flexible in terms of time and multiple purposes of one tour ...
When participating in the tour, guests will have a chance to enjoy tea under thanh tra pomelo trees, beside the typical beam houses of Hue; cycle through the small winding roads, on the two sides of which are green hedges and areca trees characteristic of Nguyet Bieu, Luong Quan; enjoy the fragrance of the country flowers; and garden with the local people, growing vegetables, peanuts, etc. From the fresh clean vegetables collected in the gardens, guests prepare lunch and enjoy the rustic dishes made by themselves.
After the morning in Thuy Bieu, visitors will discover Tam Giang in the afternoon. Here, visitors can explore the pristine beauty of the largest lagoon system in Southeast Asia and join activities such as net fishing, trap fishing... with the fishermen. With the shrimps and fishes just caught, visitors will process and enjoy the food by themselves. In the late afternoon, visitors will go on boats to watch the sunset at Tam Giang lagoon with a relaxed and gentle feeling.
To better understand indigenous people’s life, visitors can stay overnight at beam house homestays in Thuy Bieu and at local people’s houses at Chuon lagoon. Mr. Tran Quang Hao, Director of Huetourist said that they were considering overnight services at the stilt houses (“nhà chồ”) and experience services on floating markets and fishing activities in the early morning on Tam Giang lagoon so as to provide more enjoyable experiences for visitors. Besides, safety would be carefully calculated.
The highlight of the “Thuy Bieu in the morning – Tam Giang in the afternoon” tour is to offer visitors interesting experiences with the indigenous people’s life, Mr. Tran Quang Hao said. They grow vegetables and take care of trees in Thuy Bieu, and they experience net and trap fishing in Tam Giang. Local people were the ones to serve "homegrown" tours. With the tour, the company wants to create a product to meet the needs of European, North American visitors…, who always prioritize the element of exploring indigenous culture in their travel.
Dishes are made from thanh tra pomelos
Encouraging to open more tours
Participating in the “Thuy Bieu in the morning – Tam Giang in the afternoon”, a French visitor shared: "The most impressive thing of the tour is net fishing and trap fishing with the local people and then enjoy the fishes just caught. This is the first time I have experienced such activities, nothing is more interesting than it. When I return home, I will tell my friends and relatives to come here and experience these activities soon."
Mr. Ho Xuan Dai, who is serving visitors with the community tourism model and has concerns about the development of Thuy Bieu tourism, said that the services in Thuy Bieu must be rustic, they are not 5-star restaurants like the ones in urban places. It is a tranquil, peaceful place for guests to relax with the nature. Community tourism products are suitable with the locality as the environment is not polluted and the local people are not affected much by tourism activities. With the current demand, the number of services like this is not enough. The same models should be expanded in the future, because there are many beam houses surrounded by green thanh tra pomelo trees in Thuy Bieu.
The launch of the community tourism model of “Thuy Bieu in the morning – Tam Giang in the afternoon” is one of the encouraging things and follows the oriented development of Hue tourism. This is the tourism type developing strongly in the world and Vietnam, when people are always oriented towards the nature and sustainable development.
The high appreciation of this new tour is to solve benefits between the businesses and the local people living in Thuy Bieu and Tam Giang. Mr. Tran Dinh Minh Duc, Head of Travel Management, Department of Tourism said that the remarkable of the tour is to combine the different products into a closed tour within a day. This is different from the previous tours that visitors visit one destination and leave, so the time they stay in Hue is shorter. Thus visitors will spend more in Hue and the locals will benefit more. In the coming time, the department will further encourage tour operators to organize such full-day tours.
Story and photos: Duc Quang