Tua Chua and Muong Lay: the north of the province

Tua Chua

Tua Chua is a plateau of grey limestone at around 1,400 m, where small maize and tea plots are wedged between outcrops of rock. Most of the people are Hmong. The area is known in Vietnam for Shan Tuyet tea, a variety grown from tall, old trees rather than clipped bushes. The province records nearly 600 ha of tea here, including 7,933 ancient trees, mainly in the communes of Sin Chai and Ta Sin Thang; in early 2022 a national environmental association recognised 100 of the trees at Sin Chai and Hau Chua as heritage trees. Picking, mostly by Hmong women, runs from March to October.

Tua Chua is not a developed destination. A national tourism authority report notes that the tea area has no organised tourist activities yet, and roads between villages are regularly damaged by floods and landslides. What you get is a working landscape: the Ta Phin rock plateau, the tea villages, and a market at Ta Sin Thang that runs on a six-day cycle rather than a fixed weekday.

Muong Lay

The old town of Muong Lay stood at the meeting of rivers on the border of Dien Bien and Lai Chau provinces. When the Son La dam on the Da river was built, its reservoir flooded the old town; sources date the flooding between 2010 and November 2012, the year the dam was completed. The dam project resettled more than 91,000 people, most of them from ethnic minority communities, the largest resettlement in Vietnam's history.

The new town runs along both banks of the reservoir, linked by bridges. A new bridge stands more than 70 m above the level of the old Hang Tom bridge of 1967, which once crossed the river at the bottom of the gorge. Muong Lay is roughly halfway along National Road 12 between Dien Bien Phu and Lai Chau, which makes it a natural overnight stop on the northwest loop.

The dry months from October to April are safer for driving. Winter mornings on the plateau can be cold and foggy, and the views of the karst often clear only around midday. From March to October the tea is being picked, which gives the villages more activity. In the peak rains, the provincial roads up to the plateau are the most likely to be cut by landslides.

Bring enough cash from Dien Bien Phu. Do not count on cash machines on the plateau.

• Visitors who come only for the 1954 history. Neither place has battlefield sites.
• Travellers without their own transport or a driver, for Tua Chua. Public transport does not fit a short visit.
• Anyone travelling in July or August with fixed onward connections, because landslides can close roads for hours.
• People expecting a resort-style lakeside town at Muong Lay. It is a small, functional resettlement town.