Hello, my hivers friends! How are you today? I hope you all have a good Thursday. So we have passed nearly 2 weeks of the new year 2022. There are just over two weeks left until the Lunar New Year. This is an annual festival of East Asian culture, including China, Japan, Korea, and Vietnam. Every January 1, according to the lunar calendar, will be the traditional New Year's Day. In 2022, the Lunar New Year will fall on February 1, 2022. When I was a child, I was very eager to wait for the traditional New Year, because this is the biggest holiday of the year. Normally, the Lunar New Year will be celebrated from 5 to 7 days, adults will celebrate the age of children with gifts with money envelopes. So when I was a kid, I was very excited when I waited for this day. This is also an opportunity for big cities to have fireworks displays to welcome the new year. More than two years ago, when the world began to see the Covid-19 epidemic, all activities during the Lunar New Year holiday were also partially restricted. New Year's Eve is the happiest time for all Vietnamese people. People will buy new clothes, along with delicious food to treat guests visiting the house. I feel that time is passing very quickly, just two weeks ago I went on a trip with my family to a place in Kon-Tum province. That place is Mang Den, the trip to Mang Den is also my first trip in 2022. I will introduce this area to everyone, in my today's post.
Black bamboo shoots is a town in Kon Tum province, located in the KonPlong district of the Central Highlands of Vietnam. Because it is located at an altitude of 1200m above sea level, this place has a mild and cool mountainous climate all year round. The average temperature is from 16 to 22 degrees, so this place is known as the second Da Lat city of the Central Highlands. Located on the Truong Son mountain range of Vietnam, surrounded by primeval forests, the vegetation here is very rich and diverse. To get to Mang Den, there will be many roads. If we move from Da Nang city, we will have three roads to reach Mang Den. One road will go in the direction of Ah17 road, this is the famous Ho Chi Minh trail of Vietnam. Another road will be Highway 24 and Highway 24b. On this trip, we will travel by road QL24b, for a distance of 270km from Da Nang city to Mang Den town.
On this trip, the vehicle that we will move is an old Van car. In recent years, people are tending to go out and rest in their cars. Many people say it is like mobile homes, usually, people will call it mobilome. The car on this trip is a Suzuki Van, manufactured in 2003. This car has been used for nearly 20 years, my family bought it from a person in Lang Son. After buying this car, we repaired and remade this car. The engine of this car is 1.0, the speed of the car will be very difficult on this trip. The distance from Da Nang to Mang Den is a difficult road. The high slopes of the high Truong Son mountain range made the car, unable to easily run on this road. The original paint color of the car was white, which was repainted by my family with an orange color. The upper part of the car has a bagamui to put a tent enough for 2 people to sleep on the roof of the car.
This trip started very early, around 4 am we moved in the direction of Hoi An beach. Following this sea route will reach Tam Ky Quang Nam city. From Tam Ky city we will move to Binh Son district of Quang Ngai. Blocking this road is National Highway 1A, so the car still runs normally. From Binh Son District to reach Mang Den, we will have to travel another 146km. This distance is a nightmare for this car. The slopes are steep, making this car move slowly. There were steep slopes and everyone got off the car for the lighter car. Together, everyone pushed the car through the bad roads. On these bad roads, there are many beautiful waterfalls along the way, I captured 2 very beautiful waterfalls in this QL24b. Standing from the top of the pass, the weather was very foggy, there were small rains that made this road very slippery. The people sitting in this car are very worried about this distance. On this deserted pass road, there are hardly any residential areas, or cars running in the same direction, on this road.
Over 5 hours traveling on this pass road, we finally started to see Mang Den town from above. The houses at the foot of the mountain, along with the clouds above the mountains, make the scene here very majestic. When we reached the town of Mang Den, we were very happy, having just experienced our fears. Finally reached the town of Mang Den at 2 pm. My first impression when I first arrived here was that the temperature here was quite cold compared to Da Nang city. The weather here changed very suddenly, sometimes it was sunny and sometimes it was sunny. rain. The air here is also very fresh, the high mountains surrounding the town make me love this place very much. The road leading into the town, lined with tall coniferous pine trees, looked beautiful on both sides.
The beginning of 2022 is the time when people are on holiday, many tourists have come to Mang Den on New Year's Eve to celebrate the holidays. We hadn't booked a room before the trip, so that day we traveled all over town looking for a place to rest. All hotels and homestays here are full, there is no place to accept guests. We have considered the option of sleeping overnight, in our car. Fortunately, at that time, there was a kind homestay that let us rest for the night. Knowing we moved from a long distance, this host was kind enough to let us stay overnight at this house. After having a place to think about it for the night, we started to tour the land here. The first place that we started to visit today is Dak-Ke Lake, which is also very close to the area where we will spend the night.
Dak-Ke lake is known locally as Toong Ro Pong lake, belonging to Mang Den eco-tourism area. This is one of the freshwater lakes with the largest area of Mang Den town. Around Dak-ke lake area is surrounded by primeval forests. The lake here is also very clear, we were very lucky when the time we went, it was also the time when the cherry blossoms were in full bloom. Every January and February every year is the right time for visitors to come here to see the cherry blossoms bloom. Plum Blossom is a symbol of spring. Apricot blossom originates from Da Lat city, the stem is like the plum tree, and the petals are like the apricot flower. That's why this flower is named plum blossom. Near the middle of Dak-ke lake, there will be a traditional communal house of the Central Highlands people. This is one of the most beautiful places to see the cherry blossoms. I used the Flycam to fly up to capture the traditional Rong house, along with the beautiful blooming cherry blossom trees. In addition to the apricot blossom trees, this place is also planted with a very famous flower of Ha Giang city, which is the triangular flower, a symbol of Ha Giang city. The Triangle circuit flower is also one of the favorite flowers of domestic backpackers, on the occasion of October, many people will come to Ha Giang to see the triangular flowers in bloom. No need to go far when the town of Mang Den can also grow this flower, I was very suspicious of this.
I went for a walk around the lake, to photograph the cherry blossom trees, the shore of Dak-ke lake has a small staircase leading up to a hill. On this hill, there are many trees around, inside this hilly area there are a few abandoned mountain villas. I don't know why these houses are uninhabited, but this place looks very nice. Beneath the lake, there are areas decorated with wooden fishing rods, painted in a beautiful red color. I took a lot of family photos with my phone. My camera battery ran out so I couldn't take pictures here. After visiting Dak-Ke lake, we started to have dinner, at Highway 24 here. The food in Mang Den town is so good, we ordered a portion of grilled chicken, along with Com Lam. This is one of the delicious dishes of the Central Highlands. Rice is mixed with glutinous rice and put into bamboo tubes, put on the fire to bake. Grilled chicken is seasoned with a local seasoning here, so the meat has a very good aroma and taste. Eating Lam rice in bamboo tubes is a very new thing for me. After dinner, we went to a coffee shop inside this town, called Bach Duong Coffe House. The drinks here are also very good. The owner of this coffee shop is a man who has many hotels in the town of Mang Den, I learned through research. Every year during the cherry blossom season, Mang Den town will have very few rooms available for rent, most of which have been booked by tourists 1 month in advance to have a place to rest. Besides the coffee shop, there are homestay houses for rent, the room price here is also very cheap. If those who want to visit Mang Den should book a room in advance or choose a day with nice weather to be able to camp overnight in this land.
Ending the first day at Mang Den, we went to visit this place at night and started back to our house, to rest after a long day. The next morning, the weather was very nice. I used my Flycam to take high-altitude photos here. The clouds and sunrise were impressive, this morning. I use the Mavic mini 2 drones, so in strong wind conditions, I don't dare to fly far to visit this place. The area where the center of Mang Den town is also is a no-fly zone for the military, so I landed before everyone woke up. This morning, we went to visit Pa Si waterfall, which is one of the beautiful waterfalls of Mang Den. In the area where there are many traditional Rong houses of the Ro-Mam ethnic group, going to the waterfall will be planted with many kinds of flowers. When coming to the waterfall area, it will be a waterfall poured from a height of 100m, white bubbles spread throughout the space here. Pa Si waterfall eco-tourism area is one of the beautiful places of Mang Den town, with rich primeval forests, along with Rong houses of the Ro Mam people, which will help you understand the history of the land here. After visiting the whole area, we started back to Mang Den town, to start going down to Kon-Tum province.
Saying goodbye to Mang-Den, we started going down Kon-tum on the way to the Mang-Den pass. To reach Kon-Tum province, we go in the direction of Highway 24 with a distance of 60km. After arriving in Kon-Tum province, we rented a hotel here to rest and began to visit this place, the hotel that we stayed in was located very close to the Kon-Tum Cathedral. This is the first place we visited Kon-Tum. This church was built in 1918, as of today it has been more than 100 years. The architecture of the old church here is very impressive, all church materials are built of wood. Due to the time of the epidemic, the church restricted visitors' visits, I regret not being able to visit this ancient church. On the last day in this Central Highlands, we went to buy specialties here as gifts for friends and relatives. On the way we came to a very beautiful suspension bridge that we passed, that is the Kon Klor bridge. This bridge is crossed over the Dakbla river. Around this bridge are high mountains and beautiful rice fields. I took a photo of the sunset at this bridge, today's sunset is partially obscured by the clouds, but it does not lose the peaceful beauty of this place. Then I went back to my hotel and went back to Kon-Tum wooden church to take a night photo here.
This photo was taken by me with a 35mm Nikon lens, the rays of the light when taken at a small aperture make the lights more beautiful. This is also the last photo of my trip this time. Although this trip has very few days and my family has not had a good preparation for the trip. But this trip has helped me to have experiences for the next travel trips. Thank you everyone for viewing and supporting my article. See you in the next article and wish you have a good time. a good day.