|
|
|
|
|
| Travel story |
 |
Ba be adventure |
Ba be travel story:
The long journey to Ba Be took over 12 hours covering in excess of 500km. We passed through the towns of Bac Quang, Dong Hy, Thai Ngyen and Bac Kan before arriving at Ba Be. The scenery was varying. Through limestone mountain country, ethnic villages, river flats and rice paddies. Not an uninteresting moment in the whole day. We lodged down for the night in Ra Market town just short of Ba Be.
We left Ra Market Town early and arrived at Ba Be around 9am. Being a National Park it is run by the Government. This alone is a huge handicap to it's successful management and operation. The Park’s sleepy Sales Manager gave us a an impromtu demonstration of how to pick your teeth while trying to give his sales pitch and explain the Park. Being Government run, the comfort and priorities (in ranking order) of those involved are as follows:
1. Management staff
2. Employees
3. Vietnamese tourists
4. Service providers such as boat operators.
5. Foreign tourists.
As a consequence there are no staff in the Park who can speak English. My discussions were translated. All brochures are printed in Vietnamese for the convenience of the above. Foreign visitors get nothing except a brochure with pictures and Vietnamese writings.
Part of the accommodation in the park was so called ECO chalets. Nice chalets which were comfortable and of good quality but no satellite TV with English/French speaking programmes. Foreign tourists need some alternative night entertainment should they not wish to participate in the popular Vietnamese pastime of Karaoke. Vietnamese channels are of course available. These chalets were quite expensive. With some luck you might get to see some traditional dancing but experience says this will not be organised unless Vietnamese tourists make the request.
They also ran a large guest house. Somewhat tired and worn out with little to recommend it. It has satellite TV which is a small bonus. Rooms and building surrounds were tired and of poor quality. The rooms were quite expensive. Paint seems in short supply.
Interestingly there was an animal rehab caged area which had not seen an animal for many years and had become derelict and ultimately had ended up as a motorbike lockup. In fact the claims of wildlife seem exactly that; claims only. The visitors I spoke with didn't get to see anything in the forest that moved except for the leaves on the trees. Remember the park is inhabited by the Tay ethnic people who hunt in the forest for food. The Vietnamese eat anything so I suspect it has been cleaned out of fauna.
The lake itself is beautiful as are the surrounds. At one end is a Tay village where they have excellent homestay facilities at around AUD$4/night, plus food and drinks. The people are wonderful hosts and I am confident any visitor would come away very happy. There are boat cruises in the lake in small local boats and the cruise lasts for about 3-4 hours.
The price is way over the top at 400,000VND/person. Outrageous when compared to the cost of Halong Bay cruises and considering one good boatload would just about pay for the cost of the small boat. An example of a greedy price based on a captive market.
Going to the Tay village and homestay you have to survive a torturous car trip along a cliff edge track. In fact at the time of my visit there were two places where the track had given way making it difficult and potentially dangerous to traverse. A driver error or further road collapse would see passengers and car disappear down the vertical 500 ft drop to the lake.
In summary, while Ba be is very beautiful in itself it is a long way to go even direct from Hanoi. The Park is a big disappointment in terms of service and facilities. There are better places to visit to see forests, lake scenery and ethnic villages.
Directors and Management should realise that the Park is there for all tourists and if they wish to encourage more foreign visitors they should make a better effort than they do at present to provide acceptable services. Given that the Park receives significant contributions from foreign embassies they should give something back to foreign tourists.
We left the park mid morning and started the long trip back to Hanoi. Country ethnic villages did not take long to give way to larger Vietnamese towns. We stopped for lunch at the equivalent of a large truck/bus stop. The food was assessed as excellent by Minh and Chinh. In fact Vinh explained that years ago the food in these establishments was referred to as “prison food”. The reason being that these eating places were infrequent along the highway and bus drivers would bring their buses to them in return for a free feed. Thus the passengers were “locked in” so to speak to what was relatively high priced food.
We arrived back in Hanoi at 6pm tired and road weary but much more knowledgeable about the north-west of Vietnam and its charming and hospitable people.
Written by Jane
November 2007
|
[ Back ] [List story] [Go Home]
|
|
|
Tag: Ba be adventure, Ba be travel story, Ba be travel news,
Sponsored Links :
How to travel, Look at vietnam , Travel News, Travel Forum , StrongWind89, Vietnam tour, Play Games, All Vietnam Travel
|
|
