Experience the best of Lao Chai

Lao Chai stands on the slopes of the Muong Hoa valley, a deep valley of rice terraces that runs south-east below Sapa, and is home to Black Hmong families who farm rice and maize on the steep hillsides. Wooden houses stand along dirt tracks, with buffalo, chickens and children in the lanes.

A track follows the valley from Lao Chai to Ta Van, a neighbouring village of the Giay people, past terraced fields, bamboo forest and the Muong Hoa stream. Fansipan, the highest mountain in Indochina, rises behind Sapa, and Sapa town, with its stone church and market, is a short way up the slope.

Hmong cooking uses what the hills grow: sticky rice, maize, vegetable soups and grilled meats. Women sell indigo-dyed hemp cloth and embroidered bags. The terraces are brightest after planting and again before the September harvest, mist fills the valley on many winter mornings, and snow falls on the high ground in the coldest years.