Mu Cang Chai Ripe Rice Festival takes place every September with many exciting activities attracting thousands of tourists to visit. Join South Asia Travel to participate in the terraced field festival and discover the unique culture of the highlands.
1. Mu Cang Chai terraced fields festival is held annually
Mu Cang Chai Terraced Field Festival is part of Muong Lo Cultural and Tourism Week. It is considered a major festival held annually in the ripe rice season in early September with many new and attractive activities. The festival aims to introduce and promote tangible and intangible cultural values and unique tourism products of Yen Bai to domestic and international tourists.
Thereby, the festival will contribute to promoting local economic and social development; at the same time, creating a sustainable tourism development link between localities in the province and provinces in the Northwest region, forming a supply chain of high-quality tourism products, unique to Yen Bai province (old) with the criteria of new, unique, attractive, and friendly.
In 2007, the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism ranked the terraced fields in La Pan Tan, Che Cu Nha, and De Xu Phinh as national scenic relics. Since then, Mu Cang Chai – Yen Bai has held an annual terraced field festival to express gratitude to the land and sky for giving farmers a bountiful harvest.
Mu Cang Chai terraced fields are one of the famous landmarks of the Northwest region, known by many people for their majestic beauty. When settling in Mu Cang Chai, the Mong people used farming as their main farming method. Therefore, terraced fields occupy a large area in Mu Cang Chai, bringing a prosperous life to the people here.
Around this time, the rice is ready to be harvested, the yellow color spreads across the hillsides creating a mesmerizing landscape. Mu Cang Chai terraced fields have a charming beauty, formed based on the combination of nature and the skillful hands, diligence and hard work of the people, creating masterpieces of culture, bearing the identity of the Mong people.
2. Activities at Mu Cang Chai terraced fields festival
Every autumn, Mu Cang Chai bustles with the terraced field festival – an occasion to gather the most unique features of the Northwest mountains and forests. Not only can visitors admire the endless golden sea from the terraced fields winding around the mountainside, but they can also experience a series of unique cultural activities:
– Paragliding “Flying over the golden season” – watching ripe rice from the sky, feeling the majestic beauty from a bird’s eye view
– Mong ethnic costume performance, colorful brocade in the valley
– Traditional art competition
– Competition of traditional sports and folk games
– New rice celebration, pounding sticky rice cake, flax spinning and thread spinning competition – reenacting traditional working life
– Highland market – where you can buy local specialties, apple wine, sticky rice or try dishes with rich Northwest flavors
– Campfire night with cultural exchange, drunk with the flute, drunk with folk songs under the starry sky
3. Mu Cang Chai tourist paradise
Mu Cang Chai used to be a highland district in the west of Yen Bai province, 180km from Yen Bai city center and more than 300km northwest of Hanoi capital. Coming to Mu Cang Chai even just once, visitors can feel the richness of nature here, the uniqueness of culture as well as the warmth of the highland people.
The road to Mu Cang Chai is difficult but full of interesting. The scenery changes constantly, before you finish admiring the Thai stilt houses, you will reach the Muong Lo fields dyed white by Bauhinia flowers, winding roads on the slopes.
Nature has endowed Mu Cang Chai with majestic mountain peaks covered in a sea of floating clouds, and a cool climate all year round. This is an ideal place for tourists who love nature tourism, relaxation and thrills. We can participate in paragliding to conquer the sky and freely admire and explore the beauty of the majestic nature and the sky of Vietnam.
