In the minds of Vietnamese people, Phu Tho is the land of origin, where there is the sacred Hung Temple and unique cultural and religious values recognized by UNESCO. Every year, the Hung King's death anniversary on the 10th day of the 3rd lunar month is a major cultural event, attracting millions of visitors from all over the country. However, the tourism picture is still basically seasonal, focusing on the festival time, while other months are usually sparse.
After July 1, 2025, when the three provinces of Phu Tho, Vinh Phuc, and Hoa Binh merge, Phu Tho province will enter a new development phase with a completely different appearance. Larger space, richer natural resources, and more diverse cultural identities have opened up opportunities to turn the Ancestral Land into a year-round destination, but also pose many challenges.
Phu Tho 's Canh Tang Lake has a beauty that captivates tourists.
The first notable point is the scale and tourism resources now resonate from three regions. The old Phu Tho was famous for its heritage associated with the worship of Hung Kings, Xoan singing and hundreds of traditional festivals.
The old Vinh Phuc has the advantage of a dynamic economic region, strong urbanization, modern tourism infrastructure and the famous Tam Dao and Dai Lai resorts.
Old Hoa Binh contributed a system of rivers, lakes, majestic mountains, and unique Muong, Thai, and Dao cultural identities.
This combination helps Phu Tho not only become a land of festivals, but also a place where tourists can find all kinds of tourism, from spiritual tourism, ecological tourism, resorts, community tourism, experiential agriculture to adventure sports activities, conferences and seminars.
The latest statistics show a strong rebound. By July 2025, the province had 2,778 relics, of which nearly 1,000 had been ranked, 6 were special national relics and 6 were national treasures. In terms of intangible heritage, the province owned nearly 2,000 heritages, of which 5 were recognized by UNESCO.
In the first 6 months of 2025, the whole province welcomed about 14.5 million tourists, with revenue reaching over 14,800 billion VND, an average growth rate of over 10%/year.
The accommodation system has also been upgraded with more than 1,500 establishments, over 20,000 rooms, including many 4-5 star hotels capable of welcoming high-end guests. This is an important foundation for developing large-scale tourism towards sustainability.
Thanh Lanh Golf Course in Phu Tho is known as one of the most beautiful golf courses in the North, always attracting a large number of domestic and international tourists to compete and experience.
Not only stopping at numbers, geographical location is also a strategic advantage. Viet Tri urban area - the administrative center of the province is located less than 80 km from Hanoi, conveniently connected via Noi Bai - Lao Cai highway, national highways 2 and 32.
This is the gateway to the midland region, an ideal transit point for tourists from Hanoi to the Northwestern provinces. With this advantage, Phu Tho can completely become the first stop in the journey of international visitors when exploring the North.
However, behind that potential there are still many challenges. First of all is the seasonality. Tourists usually only flock to Hung Temple, Tay Thien during festivals, or to Tam Dao on hot summer days, the remaining months of the year, many tourist destinations fall into a deserted state.
Infrastructure in mountainous and remote areas is still not synchronized, roads are difficult to travel, essential services such as electricity, water, internet are not well met. Human resources serving tourism still lack foreign language skills and professional guides, while international tourism is becoming increasingly important.
Another weakness is inadequate promotion, the tourism brand of the Homeland is not strong enough to create a distinct impression compared to neighboring localities.
To keep visitors all year round, Phu Tho first needs to diversify its products. It cannot rely only on the Hung Kings' Death Anniversary and Tay Thien Festival, but must create reasons for visitors to come at any time.
“Four-season” tours need to be clearly developed. In spring, visitors can enjoy flowers and festivals, in summer they can explore waterfalls, lakes, and Thanh Thuy mineral springs, in autumn they can experience agricultural tourism and craft villages, and in winter they can go to the highlands to hunt for clouds and enjoy local cuisine.
Along with that, cultural, artistic and sports events also need to be organized regularly throughout the year such as food festivals, music festivals, mountain sports competitions, OCOP product fairs... to continuously attract visitors.
Another direction is to exploit community tourism more strongly. The old Hoa Binh region with Muong, Thai, Dao villages has a rare advantage to develop homestay and experiential tourism. Today's tourists not only want to visit but also want to "live like locals", eat, stay, and work together. If done well, this will be a product that keeps visitors coming back for a long time, while bringing direct benefits to the community.
Infrastructure is the key factor. To retain visitors, the roads must be convenient and the services must be adequate. The province needs to prioritize investment in upgrading roads to tourist destinations, improving internal traffic, ensuring basic services from electricity, water, telecommunications to waste treatment. A clean environment, preserved landscape, and complete experience are the ways to retain visitors for a long time. In addition, planning work also needs to be strict, avoiding spontaneous development, causing overload or destroying landscapes and relics.
Human resources are an indispensable factor. A destination may be beautiful, and its services may be plentiful, but if the staff lack skills, foreign languages, and friendliness, visitors will hardly return.
The province needs to promote training, link with major tourism schools, open professional training courses, and encourage the community to participate in on-site training. When the local people themselves become “tourism ambassadors”, they will not only welcome visitors with smiles but also tell cultural and historical stories associated with their homeland.
Promotional work needs to be renewed. In the digital age, an attractive video on social networks can spread the name of a tourist destination further than thousands of leaflets. Phu Tho needs to build a brand identity "Dat To Tourism - Four Seasons of Experience", promote digital media, cooperate with major travel agencies, bloggers, KOLs at home and abroad to spread the image. More importantly, each destination must have its "own story", associated with history, culture, and people to create a difference.
Another factor is regional connectivity. Tourists rarely visit a single province, but often choose a series of itineraries. Therefore, Phu Tho needs to strengthen coordination with Hanoi and the northern mountainous provinces to build closed tours, such as: Hanoi - Viet Tri - Hoa Binh Lake - Tam Dao Tourist Area - Sa Pa. When placed in an attractive chain of itineraries, Phu Tho will both benefit from the flow of visitors and affirm its position on the regional tourism map.
To make these solutions a reality, the role of the government and businesses is extremely important. The government needs to create an open and preferential mechanism for tourism investment, while strengthening management, conservation, and ensuring sustainable development. Businesses need to boldly invest in new products, improve service quality, and connect with the community for mutual development. The Phu Tho Tourism Association, established from the merger of three old associations, needs to truly become a bridge, a place to gather the will and common actions of the entire industry.
Phu Tho is the land of Hung Kings, a place where unique historical, cultural and natural values converge. After the merger, the new province is facing a great opportunity to turn those values into development strength. However, to retain visitors all year round, it is impossible to rely only on the “cradle of history”, but requires a breakthrough in thinking and decisive action.
When advantages are turned into experiences, when each season has a reason for tourists to return, when each citizen becomes a "friendly ambassador", then the Homeland will not only be a place to remember, but also a place to return to...
Quang Nam
Source: https://baophutho.vn/du-lich-dat-to-lam-gi-de-giu-khach-quanh-nam-240520.htm
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