Co Loa Citadel will become cultural-ecological park

The Ministry of Construction has sent plans to the Prime Minister for preserving, restoring and developing Co Loa Citadel in Hanoi.

According to the plan Co Loa Citadel would be developed into a cultural-ecological park and a national historical relic covering a total 860ha, spanning the communes of Co Loa, Duc Tu, Uy No and Viet Hung in Dong Anh District.

The plan includes new zoning rules and solutions for preserving and restoring the relic areas for tourism development, particularly those with high cultural and historical value, in addition to new regulations o­n construction and investment management of the citadel.

The plan also mentions solutions to build natural ecological spaces of agriculture, green parks and gardens. It would also include water management plans that would clean bodies of water and ensure their connection to the surrounding water system.

If approved, the plan would be carried out in o­ne year.

Truong Minh Tien, Deputy Director of the Hanoi Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism, said that the city will develop six key tourism clusters from now until 2020, focusing o­n cultural, spiritual, ecological and shopping.

These include Son Tay-Ba Vi, Huong Son-Quan Son, and Soc Temple-Dong Quan Lake, Van Tri-Co Loa. The others are located in the city centre: the Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum, Museum and Relic Complex inside the Presidential Palace, as well as the o­ne-pillar Pagoda, Temple of Literature, the 36 ancient streets of the Old Quarter, Hoan Kiem (Returned Sword)Lake and surrounding areas.

Co Loa was the capital of the Au Lac feudal, under King An Duong Vuong is about the 3rd century BC and the Van Xuan state under Ngo  Quyen 10 century AD. This second capital of Vietnam after Phong Chau (Phu Tho province today), is the capital of the Hung Kings.

Attractive Khot Cake

Khot cake is a very popular dish in southern Vietnam. The cake is easy to cook and suitable for the taste of many people, usually made for desert or treating guests.

Formerly, the main ingredients of khot cake were rice powder and well-grinded pork.The cake was served with flavour sauce, snack vegetable and cucumber. After that, people have made changes on the recipe creating the special features of the cake in different places.

People in the West usually mix rice powder with saffron and put more fresh shrimps when putting in the pattern. In the Centre, khot cake is served with cucumber, thin-sliced young papaya, big egg-plant…which are all soaked in weak shrimp sauce. In the North, people just use rice powder, some eggs (to make the powder more soft-rise) and dry shrimps instead of fresh ones...

In the khot cake making process, powder making is the most important. Chosen rice must be good to generate the cake powder. The ingredients of cake powder are wet grinded rice, steamed rice and grinded solid cool rice noodle. The different parts of powder are mixed mainly according to the makers’ experience. In the next step, powder is steadily stired with the water, little vinegar, coconut juice; there may be more eggs to increase cake softy or more saffron to make the cake having attractive color. The cake is treated with spice, salt, sugar, glutamate, small sliced onion... People usually use pork or shrimp, small shrimp, crab which are minced well then sauteed to make the cake filling.

They put the circle pattern in the pan, coat the pattern with hot fat, pour powder in the pattern, put the filling into the centre  then cover waiting until done to take out. After being done, cake powder becomes opaque yellow, the filling is brown-red, onion and chives which are in the fat stick to the cake making the green color.

There are also sauce and raw vegetable to be served with khot cake. Raw vegetables usually includes mint leaves, lettuce and cucumber... and the sauce can be flavour sauce or salted fish with garlic,lemon juice... depending on regions.

Romantic flower gardens of Hanoi in winter

Nhat Tan, Quang Ba, Nghi Tam, Tay Tuu, Tu Lien Village in Hanoi are famous for its colorful garden.

Daisies, sunflowers, napa cabbage flowers, peach blossom... bloom brilliantly. They make youngers, photographers, tourists in Vietnam travel  fall from grace their beauty.

Spring somewhere far behind that cold, bleak winter. But these days people go looking Hanoi  spring training all over the garden, flower village. 

A lot of tourists in in Vietnam travel have been visiting flower villages to see the flowers in all the vibrant colour.

Especially, hundreds of young people come each day to take pictures.

 

A young couple takes a photograph for the beautiful memory in flower garden

The photographer be enthralled by flower garden

 

 

The paradise with the many types of flowers

 

Quan Ba Skydook in Ha Giang

Ha Giang Province - Vietnam is famous for Dong Van Geopark which is recognized as a Karst Plateau Global Geopark by UNESCO.

The gateway to the geopark is called Quan Ba by local people meaning skydoor due to its height and the fact that fog always covers the top, which makes people think it is the door to the sky. Tam Son City in all its glory seen from Quan Ba skydoor. Not only that but it has a magnificent panoramic view of Tam Son City appearing in the green valley below. It is also the perfect spot to appreciate the beautiful Fairy Twin Mountains which lie in among the rice fields. Its reverse bowl shape has made the Twin Mountains special from other mountains. The mountains resemble a woman’s breasts - that’s why in local language they call them fairy twins. The walk to Quan Ba skydoor has some beautiful curves that are nearly always covered with fog. It takes around half an hour from Tam Son City to Quan Ba skydoor. The road is poor and is full of large trucks which slow your speed considerably as you have to be very careful to avoid accidents. Tourists can stay at Tam Son City which has nice hotels and restaurants. In addition to Quan Ba skydoor and Fairy Twin Mountains, tourists may find it interesting to go to Quan Ba market day or the Hop Tien Weaving village of H’Mong minority people.