Da Lat - City Of Thousands Of Pine Trees

Da Lat is the capital of Lam Dong Province in Vietnam. The town is located 1,500 m above sea level on the Lang Biang Plateau in the southern parts of the Central Highlands. The name Da Lat derives from the acronym of the Latin phrase “Dat Aliis Laetitiam Aliis Temperiem” ("Giving Pleasure to Some, Freshness to Others"), which the French colonial government used in their official emblem of Da Lat. In Vietnam, Da Lat is one of most popular tourist destinations.


Da Lat's specific sights are pine wood (forming the name: "City of thousands of pine trees") with twisting roads and tree marigold blossom in the winter. This city has a unique temperate weather in Vietnam's otherwise tropical climate. Mist covering the valleys almost year-round leads to its name "City of eternal spring".


Da Lat is also known as an area for science research in the fields of biotechnology and nuclear physics.


With its year-round cool weather, Da Lat supplies temperate agriculture products for all over Vietnam, for example, cabbage and cauliflower. Its flower industry produces two typical flowers: hydrangea and golden everlasting. The confectionery industry offers a wide range of Mut, a kind of fruit preserve made from strawberry, mulberry, sweet potato, and rose.


During the 1890s, explorers in the area, which was then part of the French territory of Cochinchina, asked the French governor-general, Paul Doumer, to create a resort center in the highlands. The governor agreed. The original intended site for the hill station was Dankia, but Etienne Tardif, a member of the road-building expedition of 1898-99, proposed the current site instead. In 1907, the first hotel was built. Urban planning was carried out by Ernest Hebrard.


The French endowed the city with villas and boulevards, and its Swiss charms remain today. Hebrard included the requisite health complex, golf course, parks, schools, and homes but no industry. The legacy of boarding schools where children from the whole of Indochina were taught by French priests, nuns, and expatriates lasted until the end of French rule. There were seminaries of Jesuits and other orders. The elite Vietnamese National Military Academy graduated its first class of future leaders in 1950. There was an aviation school at Cam Ly Airport.


During World War II, Da Lat was the capital of Indochina Federation, from 1939 to 1945.


The architecture of Da Lat is dominated by the style of the French colonization period. The Dominion of Mary Church and Convent were built in 1938 and offer a panoramic view of the city. The convent is a home to Roman Catholic nuns of the Mission of Charity.


Da Lat is home to the manmade, 5 km² Xuan Huong Lake. The average temperature is 17°C, and does not exceed 25°C in the hottest season. Its temperate climate is ideal for agricultural production. Da Lat is renowned for its orchids, roses, vegetables, and fruits. There is a nascent wine-making and flower-growing industry in the region.


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Ha Long Bay - One Of The Most Popular Travel Destinations

Ha Long (literally: Descending Dragon) Bay is a UNESCO World Heritage site located in Quang Ninh province. The bay features thousands of limestone karsts and isles in various sizes and shapes. Ha Long Bay is a center of a larger zone which includes Bai Tu Long bay to the northeast, and Cat Ba islands to the southwest. These larger zones share similar geological, geographical, geomorphological, climate and cultural characters. Ha Long Bay has an area of around 1,553 km², incuding 1,960 islets, most of which are limestone.


Historical research surveys have shown the presence of prehistorical human beings in this area ten of thousands years ago. Nowadays, Ha Long Bay is one of the most popular travel destinations in Vietnam.


500 years ago, Nguyen Trai praised the beauty of Ha Long Bay in his verse Lo Nhap Van Don, in which he called it "rock wonder in the sky". In 1994 the core zone of Ha Long Bay was listed by UNESCO in its World Heritage Sites. Together with Nha Trang Bay and Lang Co of Vietnam, Ha Long Bay is recognized as one of the most beautiful bays of the world.


Local legend has it that long ago, when the Vietnamese were fighting invaders, the gods sent a family of dragons to help defend the land. This family of dragons began spitting out jewels and jade. These jewels turned into the islands and islets dotting the bay, linking together to form a great wall against the invaders. The people kept their land safe and formed what later became the country of Vietnam. After that, dragons were interested in peaceful sightseeing of the earth and then decided to live here. The place where Mother Dragon flew down was named Ha Long, the place where the dragon children attended upon their mother was called Bai Tu Long island (Bai: attend upon, Tu: children, Long: dragon), and the place where the dragon children wriggled their tails violently was called Bach Long Vy island (Bach: white - colour of the foam made when Children Dragon wriggle, Long: dragon, Vy: tail).


The most remarkable geological events of Ha Long Bay’s history in the last 1,000 years include the advance of the sea, the raising of the bay area and the strong erosion that has formed coral and pure blue and heavily salted water. This process of erosion by seawater has deeply engraved the stone, contributing to its fantastic beauty. Present-day Ha Long Bay is the result of this long process of geological evolution that has been influenced by so many factors.


It is because of all these factors that tourists now visiting Ha Long Bay are not only treated to one of the true wonders of the world, but also to a precious geological museum that has been naturally preserved in the open air for the last 300 million years.


A community of around 1600 people live on Ha Long Bay in fishing villages. They live on floating houses and are sustained by capture fishing and marine aquaculture (cultivating marine biota).


Seafood in Ha Long is diversified. Cuttlefish, oyster, cyclinae, prawn (penaeidea, panulirus, parapenaeopsis...), sipunculoideas, nerita, charonia tritonis are among the varieties appearing in popular local dishes.


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