The fruit of the forest

In Tu Son Commune, Kim Boi District of Hoa Binh Province, you can find Thac Bac- Long Cung (the Silver Waterfall- Dragon Palace). It’s a little known but great getaway spot thanks to 120ha of natural forest filled with waterfalls, wildlife and exotic plants, plus an average temperature that is 5 degrees Celsius below the average in Hanoi all year round.

One of the most attractive features of the resort’s scenery is a 6-km long streamline which starts from a small pond on a mountain peak, nearly 1,000m high. If you have your walking boots on it’s well worth the hike.

Running out of the pond there are three streams spilling out and down the mountainside, eventually running through two communes in Cao Phong District and also into Tu Son commune of Kim Boi District.

Further down the mountain there are nine larger waterfalls. The biggest waterfall is the Silver Waterfall, which has a pond 7m deep. The perfect spot to wet your hot feet, cool down and freshen up after a long walk.

If you’re draw to dark and mysterious spaces, near the waterfall is a small but long cave which leads deep into the heart of the mountain, which shares the same water source of the streams outside.

By another waterfall, not far from the Silver Waterfall, there is a watch-tower where you climb up to take in the breathtaking panorama of Kim Boi region.

Kim Boi in Sino-Vietnamese means literally a gold cup. It was named so as the region is home to numerous gold ore deposits.

In the streamline of the resort, however, you won’t find anyone panning for gold as it isn’t an auriferous spot. Instead, you will find merely copper or iron. So don’t get too excited as all that glitters is not gold.

One waterfall near the mountain peak houses a strange and ominous looking stone placed between two steep and rather dangerous looking cliffs.

The stone’s odd, or incongruous presence, inspired the resort’s investor, Dai Lam Joint Stock Company based in Hanoi, to name it Thien Thach, which means ‘meteorite’.

To reach this earthly meteorite, you have to climb up a long soil road beside the waterfall and from there a tourist guide from the resort can show you the way to a field-combat helicopter landing site, used by the French army before 1954.

Most of the tourist guides in the resort come from the local Muong ethnic families and are always keen to help tourists out.

Thac Bac-Long Cung is also a veritable kingdom of wild banana and giay (aracea) trees. A giay leaf may be as large as one square metre, so it could double up as a natural umbrella should you get stuck in a downpour, though one should be careful as it produces a very itchy gum.

Thac Bac- Long Cung is also a gateway to the Thuong Tien Natural Reserve Area. Set up in 1986, the area covers over 1,500ha of forests on karst topography and is home to several native plants and precious wildlife such as Tibetan bears and wildcats.

Tourists can stay overnight at small stilt-houses in the traditional style of the local Muong ethnic population. Daytrippers can also just lunch there and have a well deserved siesta.

One of the more eye catching stilt-houses to look out for is made entirely from bamboo materials and has a fair dark yellow colour.

At the resort’s information centre, there is a restaurant serving the best culinary specialties of the Muong people, such as hard-boiled meat placed on banana leaves and meat mixed with banana duramen. You should really try these dishes.

If you’re looking for places around Thac Bac- Long Cung a few kilometres away is the well-known Kim Boi hot mineral water springs and Dong Thech, a national relic.

Presently, Viettel mobile phone network works well in the resort, while in two years to come, the resort’s investor expects to upgrade the resort to a three-star one.