Y Ty, Vietnam

Y Tý (Y Ty) [yee tee] is a mountainous commune in Bat Xat District, Lào Cai (Lao Cai) Province and about 70 km from Ga Lào Cai (Lào Cai Station).

Y Tý is home to Núi Lảo Thẩn (Lao Than mountain), dubbed the roof of Y Tý. Standing at 2,860 metres, it fuses together the clouds, sun and wind into mesmerising scenaries but when I was there in December 2022, the element of winter temperatures decided to join in as well.

My objective for Y Tý was to trek and conquer Núi Lảo Thẩn. 💪🏽

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Y Ty is near the border with China. If you intend to stay overnight, you need to have a permit from the immigration office. You can go to a travel agency and pay them to apply for you. It may take more than a day so be prepared to stay in Lao Cai for a night.

Before Arrival

As Y Tý is very close to the border with China, I was told that I had to apply for a permit from the Lào Cai provincial police if I wanted to stay overnight. I was not able to find that information online, took a gamble and went to Y Tý without it.

True enough, my trek guide confirmed it when I arrived. He warned that if I did not have the permit and if we were caught by the police on patrol, both of us would get into trouble and it would be reported to my country's authority as well. As I did not want to put us at such unnecessary inconvenience and risk, I had to derive a contingency plan to return to Lào Cai to apply for the permit, return for the trek and minimise disruptions to my adventure.

The permit has to be applied through a travel agency as they would have to be your guarantor. I paid 1,200,000 VND for mine and had to stay overnight in Lào Cai as it was ready only the next morning.

From Lao Cai to Y Tý

Y Tý was an untouched tourist destination in its raw state thus there was no public bus plying to and from the train station but fortunately, there was a private van service.

The departure time from the train station was at about 0700 hours and about 1330 hours from the junction outside my homestay at Y Tý. The fare was 120,000 VND per way. There were other timings as well.

The private van service started from the parking space in front of the train station and I would recommend getting in touch with the operator before arrival so that you could board the van promptly without being hassled by other drivers.

It would also be good if you have your homestay confirmed before arrival so that you could inform the driver of your destination. You could also inform your homestay of your location along the way so that they could look out for the van and your arrival or communicate with the driver if the need arises.

Although 70 km sounded relatively near, it took about 3 hours to get from the train station to my homestay in Y Tý in the van. It was mainly due to the narrow winding mountainous roads after the van left Y Tý town and partly due to the driver stopping to pick up and drop off deliveries along the way.

As the ride can be bumpy for some, you may want to standby motion sickness bags.

Arriving at Y Tý

Depending on the location of your homestay, you may need to walk from the main road where the van alights you.

Mine was just a short minute's walk but because I had a cabin-sized luggage with me and the rocky path to the homestay would kill my luggage's wheels if I dragged it along, I had to carry it and the walk felt like a kilometre. 😓

As I walked down the path, I was greeted by a mesmerising view of greenery fields set on a backdrop of majestic mountains and forgot about my 'long' walk.

In and Around Y Tý and Núi Lảo Thẩn

I had planned for 2 days in Y Tý to visit Thien Sinh Bridge and Green Waterfall on my day of arrival, trek Núi Lảo Thẩn the next day and move on to my next destination after descending from the mountain the following day but because of the permit, I wasted a day, had to miss visiting the 2 locations and reconfigure the next leg of my adventure at Sapa.

After I got my permit done and upon my arrival back at my homestay in Y Tý, I changed to my trekking gear immediately and the guide and myself set off for Núi Lảo Thẩn promptly at about 1538 hours.

The trek to the camp for the overnight stay would normally take about 3 hours (during the day, at the fastest) to 5 hours but because we started late and it would be good to arrive before sunset for safety reasons, we had to quicken our pace and managed to arrive just after sunset at about 1853 hours, in 3 hours 15 minutes.

The camp was a cold-and-wind-insulated hut that could easily accommodate up to 50 trekkers. As there was no electricity on the mountain, we had to rely on a solar-battery-powered LED light for the night.

We had chicken steamboat, powered by a portable stove, for dinner. The hot and slightly spicy soup was so comforting in the cold winter weather.

As outside was in total darkness and freezing, we had to stay indoors and as there was nothing much to do after dinner, we rested early as we had to rise early the next morning as the plan was to trek to the summit to watch sunrise at 6 plus.

We set off for the peak at about 0600 hours the next morning. The last lap was quite challenging as the terrain was unforgiving and cold winds slammed us mercilessly but we pressed on and managed to reach the summit in under an hour.

Upon seeing the peak marker, I felt an ultimate sense of achievement in the longest while and forgot about the fatigue that set in on the way up.

I conquered Núi Lảo Thẩn! ✌🏽

Taking photos with the marker was a definite must.

As it was foggy, we did not manage to see a proper sunrise. After looking around a bit, we commenced our descend back to the camp.

After we had a quick breakfast, we packed up and bade farewell to Núi Lảo Thẩn

On the way down, we pit-stopped at the human-faced rock but ironically, with the clouds, they did not form a nice sea for us to take 'fishing' photos. ☹️

Descending was much easier and faster. I commenced descend at 0948 hours and arrived at the base in under 2 hours, at 1137 hours.

Departing Y Tý

After changing out of my trekking gear, I recovered for a while before packing up, caught the van back to Lào Cai for the onward connection to the next leg of my adventure at Sapa.