Leaving the city to return to his hometown of Tram Tau (Lao Cai) to start a tourism career, Minh Nghia has nearly 10 years of experience on the dangerous Northwest trekking routes that guide Westerners to climb mountains.
Leaving the city, leaving work to return to my hometown to start a business
Located between Hanoi and Sa Pa streets, Tram Tau once stood out in the tourist community with hot springs, along with many media articles and word of mouth introductions from tourists.
Tram Tau is also known for the trekking routes conquering Ta Chi Nhu and Phu Sa Phin peaks. However, from 2012 - 2015, these mountain climbing routes, despite the rich forests and beautiful cloud hunting season, still lacked services for tourists.
Recognizing the adventurous tourism potential of her homeland, Bui Thi Minh Nghia (35 years old, Lao Cai) after graduating from university in business administration and working in an office for 3 years in Hanoi, chose to return to her hometown to start a business.
When she was a university student, Ms. Nghia had a hobby of wandering through museums in Hanoi, following tourist groups, or backpacking by motorbike, mountain climbing with friends across the Northeast and Northwest routes. Her love for tourism grew over the years, when she returned to her hometown in Tram Tau, she learned more English to get an international tour guide card, started a young travel company specializing in trekking tours and opened a homestay named Zoni at her parents' house.
In 2016, she opened a Phu Sa Phin mountain climbing tour for 2 groups of tourists but was unsuccessful because the road was too hard and transportation was difficult. "In the following years, climbing in Tram Tau was still a dead end, small or landslide route, I thought I probably wouldn't return to making tours here anymore," Ms. Minh Nghia recalled.
In 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic heavily affected the entire tourism industry, forcing Ms. Nghia to think about how to escape difficulties. “At that time, the trend of traveling close to nature was popular. I researched the market and surveyed the locality, people had repaired roads, set up shacks, and had luggage service for guests... gradually becoming more professional. Tram Tau at that time only had a few simple small homestays around the hot spring area. I saw this as a suitable opportunity for me when the competitiveness was not high, capital was small, and I had experience working as a tourism company,” Ms. Nghia recounted.
The bumpy path of adventure tourism
The pandemic ended, and in 2023, the number of international visitors returning to Vietnam gradually recovered. At that time, adventure tourism became the main product, a unique highlight of Tram Tau tourism. With 2 peaks in the Top 13 highest peaks in Vietnam and a majestic waterfall system, Tram Tau has well exploited this strength to become a tourism product, attracting tourists who like to conquer nature.
Tram Tau has formed many diverse tours, gradually upgrading the tour guide team, strengthening management and improving safety measures.
In 2024, the number of tourists to Tram Tau reached 152,500, of which international visitors reached 37,440. Total revenue from tourism reached 120 billion VND.
Initially, Tram Tau did not have foreign tourists, using promotional tools, social networks... Ms. Nghia integrated information about her homeland through available tours. Gradually, her family's homestay began to welcome short-term Western guests. Later, tourists introduced it word-of-mouth and Ms. Minh Nghia proactively linked up with a company specializing in motorbike tours and other mountain tours, the source of tourists to homestays was more diverse and stayed longer.
The number of visitors and revenue in 2025 compared to 2024 increased slightly by about 15%, my number of Vietnamese visitors this year is not as good as last year, but fortunately, the number of international visitors increased, so revenue was not too affected," Ms. Minh Nghia shared.
There were times when financially exhausted, Ms. Minh Nghia had to sell her car to cover debts and invest in homestays. After the low season and heavy storms and floods such as Super Typhoon Yagi in 2024 and Typhoon Bualoi in 2025, which coincided with the very beautiful ripe rice season, customers canceled tours and rooms en masse.
Ms. Minh Nghia and her husband once thought about selling homestays, finding a more convenient place for customers. However, gradually overcoming difficulties, borrowing capital from banks, her family kept the land and homestay.
Currently, I am not thinking about giving up or changing careers, but only thinking about changing the way of doing things, improving the quality of facilities and tourism services to suit the needs of tourists," Ms. Minh Nghia shared.
Not stopping at accommodation services, Ms. Nghia maintains mountain climbing tours, links and creates jobs for the H'Mong, Thai, Tay people... Homestay business is supported by her husband, Ms. Nghia still guides customers on mountain climbing tours and motorbike tours herself every month. Many customers from Europe, America, Australia... who have toured with Ms. Minh Nghia are impressed with the short, lightweight but always persistent and enthusiastic girl. After the tour, Ms. Nghia received many positive reviews on Google, Tripadvisor...
After 5 years of operation, the homestay of Ms. Minh Nghia's family has become a familiar stop for many mountain climbing groups, as well as motorbike tours and village trekking in Tram Tau.
Amidst the windy mountainsides of Tram Tau, Ms. Minh Nghia's journey "leaving the city to return to her hometown" is not noisy or flashy, but as persistent as her daily mountain footsteps. The road ahead is still full of challenges, but like the bumpy trekking routes in the Northwest, just enough passion and endurance, for Ms. Minh Nghia, each step opens up a new perspective.
It's a bit of a bit of a bit of a bit of a bit of a bit.
It's a bit of a bit of a bit of a bit of a bit of a bit.
