Mai Châu Travel Guide: From A to Z

Located in the west of Hòa Bình, adjacent to Mộc Châu district of Sơn La, Mai Châu valley is a top destination for many young people who love the beauty of nature as well as the culture of mountainous ethnic groups.

Mai Châu Travel Guide: From A to Z

Planning Your Mai Châu Trip

Mai Châu is a suitable destination in all seasons of the year, you can explore the beauty of each season in Mai Châu as follows:

November - February: Winter season, cool atmosphere, cherry blossoms, and plum blossoms blooming white in a corner of Mai Châu.

March - April: Pleasant weather, comfortable with the blooming of Bauhinia flowers.

May - August: The climate is quite cool, there are no flowers but there are plums and peaches for you to pick. At the beginning of September, there is Independence Day attracting thousands of tourists from both domestic and international destinations.

Traveling to Mai Châu

Mai Châu is approximately 140km from Hanoi and about 60km from Hoa Binh City to the northwest. To travel to this highland district of Hoa Binh, you can choose to travel by motorbike or take a passenger car to Mai Châu.

From Hanoi to Mai Châu, you can take 2 routes:

- Route 1: Hanoi Center - Nguyen Trai - Ba La (Ha Dong) - Xuan Mai - Highway 6 - Thung Khe Pass - Tong Dau Intersection - Mai Châu

- Route 2: Hanoi Center - Tran Duy Hung - Thang Long Avenue - Xuan Mai - Highway 6 - Thung Khe Pass - Tong Dau Intersection - Mai Chau

From Hanoi, travelers can catch a bus at My Dinh Bus Station, Giap Bat (with ticket prices around 100,000 - 120,000 VND) to Tong Dau Intersection and then take a motorbike taxi to the town, about 5km away.

Mai Chau town is quite small so you can rent a bicycle to explore the villages, not necessarily using a motorbike. Most stilt houses in Lac village offer bicycle rental services.

Must-visit attractions in Mai Chau

Thung Khe Pass

Part of National Highway 6, Thung Khe Pass in Hoa Binh province is about 1,000m above sea level. Here, tourists can enjoy various local dishes sold along the roadside such as boiled corn, sugarcane, and bamboo-tube rice dipped in sesame. Moreover, from the top of Thung Khe Pass, you can overlook the entire valley below the pass, known as one of the most beautiful scenic spots in Hoa Binh province.

Lac Village

Lac Village boasts a history of over 700 years. Inhabitants here are mainly the Black Thai people, who have lived generation after generation, primarily engaged in rice cultivation and traditional weaving. It's like a gift from the mountains, offering tranquility and serenity to those who appreciate it, inviting them to immerse themselves in the lush green space of Hoa Binh's forests.

Presently, Lac Village features nearly 30 spacious and airy homestays to cater to the needs of tourists. Each stilt house in Lac Village stands tall, spacious, and clean, maintaining its ancient architectural style. Inside each homestay, you'll find neatly arranged blankets, mattresses, and pillows.

Walking around the village, you won't encounter any aggressive vendors or persistent sales pitches. Items like scarves, Thai dresses, cute purses, bows and arrows, bamboo flutes, buffalo bells, gongs, and buffalo horns are displayed in front of houses. You can try them on, take photos without feeling pressured to buy anything. Even if you don't make a purchase, the sellers won't mind.

Pom Coong Village

Similar to other Muong and Thai villages, residents of Pom Coong Village often settle near rivers and streams, building their homes against the hills, with vast fields stretching out in front of them.

The captivating highlight of Pom Coọng in tourism is its exceptionally clean environment, from clean water sources to well-organized water facilities and toilets, creating a sense of freshness and safety for visitors. Additionally, waste here is sorted, stored in bins, and properly disposed of. Therefore, when you come here, you'll feel the purity of the land and the tranquility of life.

Luong Cave

Located within the Pù Khà mountain range of Mai Châu town, about 2 km from Lac Village by road, Luong Cave is an ideal tourist destination for those who enjoy exploration and seeking unique experiences in Mai Châu. Luong Cave, also known as Bó Luông by the White Thai people, meaning a large water mine, consists of 4 main caves, famous for its unique stalactite formations. During the resistance against the French, this place served as a meeting point for our troops and people. After exploring Luong Cave, at the final cave, visitors will witness an underground stream flowing into a nearby lake.

Evening Cave

Evening Cave sits atop the limestone cliffs of Pù Khà. The name Evening Cave was given by the locals of Mai Châu because every evening, sunlight shines directly into the cave, illuminating the stalactites, creating a magnificent spectacle.

Evening Cave is quite spacious, divided into two levels, with a relatively flat and cool interior. Inside the cave is a forest of shimmering and mystical stalactites. These stalactites are found in all directions, from left to right, and from the ceiling down, exhibiting various vibrant forms. As you venture deeper into the cave, you'll be truly amazed by the splendid and majestic beauty of the stalactite forest, forming a scene of grandeur bestowed upon Mai Châu by nature.

Pà Cò Market

Pà Cò Market is located about 40km north of Mai Châu town, amidst the central areas of 3 communes: Hang Kia, Pà Cò (Mai Châu), and Loóng Luông (Mộc Châu, Sơn La). Pà Cò Market only convenes every Sunday, when the mist still blankets the forests and mountains, the H'Mong people from the highlands of Mai Châu eagerly descend to the market. This highland market is not just a place for trading goods but also a meeting point for socializing among the highland folks.

Despite happening only once a week, Pà Cò Market bustles and thrives like a festival, a traditional Tet market. The market offers a wide array of products, from agricultural produce, livestock, fabrics, handicrafts, farming tools to household items, electronics, CDs, cosmetics, and more.

Pà Cò Market is situated in Pà Cò commune, Mai Châu district. From the Mai Châu town center, you can reach here by motorcycle or private car via National Highway 6.

Moreover, to facilitate visits to the market and surrounding villages, you can book a tour to Pà Cò Market at Mai Châu Lodge. When booking a tour at Mai Châu Lodge, besides visiting the market, local guides will take you to tea hills, ethnic villages in the Hang Kia area, and explore hidden gems known only to locals.

Delicious dishes not to miss when traveling to Mai Châu

Bamboo Rice

The first and perhaps the most famous dish of Mai Châu is bamboo rice. This dish is not overly complicated with young bamboo tubes filled with rice and grilled over fire, served with sesame salt, grilled pork... However, preparing this dish requires skillfulness and meticulousness. Rice is the crucial ingredient, and when making bamboo rice, people choose the characteristic rice of the mountainous region, small grains, slender, emitting a fragrant aroma when cooked.

Sticky Rice on Terraced Fields

In Mai Châu, enjoying sticky rice made by Thai women allows you to fully appreciate its delicious taste. The Thai people always choose terraced rice to make sticky rice. It is a type of glutinous rice grown by the Thai people on the terraced fields in Mai Châu valley.

The rice is soaked for several hours to soften before making the sticky rice. Thai women do not steam the rice in pots or steamers like the Kinh people do but put the rice in a wooden mortar. The rice cooks with steam rather than boiling. The cooking process is very elaborate and requires skillfulness. After it emits a fragrant smell, take the sticky rice out and put it in a basket. However, at this point, the rice is not fully cooked. Stir the rice evenly in the basket for a while and then put it in the wooden mortar and continue until the rice is cooked. The grains of terraced rice are now shiny, capturing the fragrant aroma.

Mường Pork

Muong Pig, also known as armpit pig, is a type of pig with a long body, pointed snout, small ears, skinny legs, long and stiff hair. They are raised in natural conditions, freely roaming in the forest, only eating plants and grass, not consuming any industrial food, so their meat is firm, lean, low in fat, deliciously fragrant, and naturally sweet when eaten.

This is one of the flavorful dishes from the highland regions, a specialty that cannot be missed in the hospitality of the people in the Northwest mountains.

Bitter Bamboo Shoots

Wild bamboo shoots are a specialty of Mai Chau and are always available in households because people often go to the forest to pick bamboo shoots to pickle or dry for gradual consumption. Many tourists have humorously named this dish 'Love' because when they first taste the bamboo shoots, they find them bitter, but after swallowing, they taste the sweet water of the bamboo.

Wild Bee Stir-fried Sour Bamboo Shoots

Wild bees are not easy to find, they only appear seasonally, so if you want to enjoy dishes made from wild bees, you should visit Mai Chau at the end of summer. The wild bee nests, as big as a small basket, brought back by the villagers, are used for medicine and to prepare specialties that the plain regions do not have.

Usually, mature brown bees are soaked in alcohol by locals. However, for culinary purposes, only young bees with round, chubby, white bodies are selected. Wild bees can be stir-fried with lime leaves like lemongrass, but here, locals often stir-fry them with sour bamboo shoots.

Hill Chicken Meat

Hill chickens are raised in gardens, on hills, and in forests, nurtured naturally. Anyone who has tasted authentic Mai Chau hill chicken cannot forget its uniquely delicious aroma. The meat is extremely fragrant, characteristic of no other chicken breed. To enjoy this hill chicken dish at its best, it should only be boiled until fully cooked, at which point the meat remains firm and crispy, served with a dipping sauce made of chili salt mixed with lime leaves, and the broth, sweet and savory, is used to accompany hot rice.

Phao Leaf Water

A special beverage in Mai Chau, brewed from a type of available forest leaf. After being bent, dried, and finely chopped, the leaf water has a bitter taste, with the scent of Chinese and Vietnamese herbs, along with the aroma of forest leaves. Phao leaf water is very good to drink, stimulating digestion and providing nutritional and immune-boosting effects.

Where to Travel in Mai Chau?

If you've ever set foot in Mai Chau, familiar and fond of the images of Thai stilt houses, yet still yearn for an experience in a private space with premium services, head to Mai Chau Lodge.

Mai Chau Lodge nestles amidst the lush green rice fields of Mai Chau valley, inspired by nature, built from natural materials with thatched roofs, bamboo interiors, and wooden furniture in traditional style.

To fully explore the picturesque and simple Mai Chau valley, Mai Chau Lodge offers you many interesting options from leisurely biking or walking to Lac and Poong Coọng villages or exploring Mo Luong Cave, Pa Co market..., contributing to making your trip memorable.

Mai Chau Lodge operates based on ecological principles, minimizing direct impacts on the natural environment and society. The resort offers a full range of services: swimming pool, spa, restaurant catering to customer needs. In addition, tourists can participate in traditional music performances, nature walks, hands-on cooking of local dishes... thereby understanding and appreciating some aspects of Thai culture.

Furthermore, in Mai Chau, there are 2 famous tourist villages, Lac and Pom Coọng, both with many households providing accommodation services in the form of stilt houses for tourists. When staying in these stilt houses, it's usually a communal sleeping arrangement, with each person having their own space (complete with blankets, pillows, and mattresses for each person).

According to Mytour

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Reference: Travel Guide by Mytour