Over just six days my boyfriend and I managed to cram in visits to Vinh Long, Can Tho, Rach Gia and Phu Quoc Island, exploring the waters in between by boat and bike.
The Mekong Delta was the last stop during a month-long tour of the country, and we discovered that Vietnam had saved its best for last.
Our days started and finished early. We rose at five am and took long boat journeys through the leaking dawn which allowed us to see most of the early morning activity on the Delta.
More than 200 Vietnamese and foreign delegates made a fact-finding tour of the northern province of Ninh Binh on February 25 to explore its investment opportunities and natural beauty.
They included ambassadors and their wives, embassy staff, and representatives from international organisations and non-governmental organisations in Hanoi.
Provincial leaders reported that in 2011 Ninh Binh achieved a GDP growth rate of 16.1 percent, with industry and construction accounting for 49 percent of its economic structure, services 36 percent, and agro-forestry-fisheries 15 percent.
Every visitor to Can Tho will inevitably spend at least a morning at Cai Rang floating market, a vibrant, colourful and revealing symbol of the Mekong Delta’s largest city.
Life at Cai Rang floating market rises before the sun. By 5am the market is up and running. It is essentially a floating, wholesale greengrocer’s. Traders come from across the Mekong’s network of waterways and canals to buy and sell fruit and vegetables.
Montgomerie Links, near Da Nang City, hosted the ‘2012 Swing to Swim Charity Golf Day’ on March 17 to raise funds for survival swimming programmes in the central region of Vietnam, where more children die from drowning than road accidents.
The second annual event, organized by Montgomerie Links and the Aussie Rules footy club Vietnam Swans, is aiming to raise US$25,000 to donate to local swimming programs — Swim Vietnam and Swim Safe in Da Nang. The event is supported by The Royal Life Saving Society Australia (RLSSA) and Auscham Vietnam.
Travel firms and linguistic experts commented that the new tourism logo of Vietnam is colorful and vague, which is not very connected to Vietnamese tourism.
The Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism on December 27, made public the new slogan and symbol of the Vietnam tourism promotion program in 2012-2015: “Vietnam – Timeless Charm” and the five petal lotus.
This symbol and slogan, designed by Tran Hoai Duc, replace the existing lotus bud symbol and the slogan “Vietnam – Hidden Charm.”
Despite warnings about the economic difficulties in 2012, companies of Vietnam tour still believe that the turnover of the tourism industry would still be high in the year, after enjoying a bountiful crop last Tet holiday.
In economic difficulties, tourism relating sectors can live well
Though travel firms made a fat profit last Tet holiday, analysts believe that the tourism sector would not see a higher growth rate in 2012, because people would have to fasten their belt amid the forecasts about economic difficulties.
Small and medium carriers in Hanoi complain that the demand is too low in the first month of the Lunar New Year in comparison with the previous years, though it is now the festival season.
Demand weak
Worshiping together with traveling on the first days of the spring seems to be the spiritual need for many people. Therefore, in previous years, the demand for transport services was always very high after Tet. The vehicle rent jumped by 15-30 percent, from ordinary days. Especially, on auspicious days, which Vietnamese people believed were good for the departures, the rent might increase by 40-50 percent.
The local sea tourism having suffered bad performance in many previous years has gradually revived in recent times and this year it even has strong expectation of achieving better growth, local agents said.
A number of cruise ships operating in Asian regions have re-scheduled regular routes to Vietnam while some others running on routes around the world have begun dropping by a few small ports at home besides familiar destinations like Ho Chi Minh City and Nha Trang.
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