Nice By Vietnam

  A boat with color lanterns and pinwheels in Hoi An's Hoai River, Quang Nam Province. Photo by VnExpress/Nguyen Dong Local officials have instructed all ships and boats on the Hoai River to remove lanterns and pinwheels, saying these colorful decorations affect Hoi An Town's image. On Saturday, many ships and boats on the river had to take down their lanterns and colorful decorative pinwheels at the request of the Hoi An People's Committee. Each boat is only allowed to keep two lanterns hanging on the front and rear of the boat, and these should not be higher than a sitting passenger. Vo Phung, Standing Vice Chairman of Quang Nam Tourism Association, said removal of the lanterns and pinwheels was necessary because too many colors affect the landscape of the old town, known for its yellow walls and old red tiled roofs. Boats with lanterns of various colors, shapes and types, combined with green and red pinwheels, have been on the Hoai River since 2018. Phung, director of Ho

  Vietnam will fully reopen inbound tourism from March 15 after nearly two years. Most restrictions will be lifted, but there are some requirements to keep in mind.

  Foreign tourists with a hotel guide (R) in Hoi An, March 18, 2020. Photo by VnExpress/Xuan Tan Hotels and travel firms across Vietnam are scrambling to recruit staff and increase personnel training after the government agreed to fully reopen international tourism from March 15. Since early February, Hotel Job, a leading recruitment website in Vietnam's tourism industry, has posted 150 hiring announcements from hotels, resorts, restaurants, amusement parks across the country. It has also received 1,000 candidate profiles for management and housekeeping positions. Le Quoc Viet, director of the Santa Company, which runs Hotel Job, said that recruitment demand has doubled against the same period before the pandemic and page traffic was continuing to rise. He also noted that during the  Tet  or Lunar New Year break, most tourist destinations were packed with tourists, a clear sign that the sector was recovering. Given the context of recovery alongside the government announcing an offi

  Two elephants live at Yok Don National Park in Vietnam's Central Highlands after spending years serving tourists. Photo courtesy of Yok Don National Park Elephant residents of the Yon Don National Park in Dak Lak Province will no longer be exploited for tourism purposes. They can roam free in their natural habitat. In 2018, the park's management signed an agreement with Hong Kong-based animal welfare organization Animals Asia to halt elephant rides, following which it became the first locality in Vietnam to decide not to use elephants for tourism purposes. Yon Don, which spans around 115,500 hectares from Dak Lak to Dak Nong in the Central Highlands, used to attract tourists for elephant rides, a practice decried as animal abuse by activists and international organizations. In 2014, the park launched a service where visitors could experience being a mahout, gradually replacing elephant rides. In 2018, the park officially stopped the rides and other services, releasing all the

  Foreign tourists in front of the Central Post Office in downtown HCMC, February 2020. Photo by VnExpress/Tam Linh The Ho Chi Minh City tourism department on Friday announced a list of 13 hotels and six tourist attractions eligible to serve foreign tourists starting this month. These include Rex Hotel, Sheraton Saigon Hotel, InterCotinental Saigon Hotel, Liberty Central Saigon Citypoint, Liberty Central Saigon Center Riverside, Liberty Central Saigon Center, Vien Dong Hotel and Silverland Sakyo, all in District 1. Other hotels are Windsor Plaza Hotel and Equatorial Hotel in District 5, Novotel Saigon Center and Ramana Saigon in District 3, and Eastin Grand Saigon in Phu Nhuan District. Six attractions allowed to welcome back foreign tourists are the Central Post Office, Ho Chi Minh Museum, Ao dai Museum, Cu Chi Tunnels, Sac Forest Tourism Area and Saigon Skydeck Observatory in Bitexco Financial Tower. The list will be effective until Vietnam fully reopens its tourism on March 15, by w

  JP Klovstad, a Norwegian tour guide, show kids photos on his camera during his trip to the Mekong Delta, 2018. Photo courtesy of JP Klovstad Tour guides who specialize in serving inbound tourists have seen some light at the end of the tunnel with the government announcing full tourism reopening next month. Several challenges still await, but the feeling of relief is palpable. JP Klovstad, a Norwegian who works as a tour guide for Albatros Travel, a Danish company specializing in bringing Norwegian tourists to Vietnam and Southeast Asia, told  VnExpress International  he was very happy to hear that the borders would reopen soon. "Many in Norway and the rest of the world are ready to travel. It will be great for hotels, restaurants in Vietnam to get tourists back," said the 60-year-old resident of HCMC's Thu Duc City. The government has agreed to  reopen inbound and outbound tourism from March 15  under new normal conditions, with foreign tourists allowed to travel freely