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Asia Pacific
PATA Award for Vietnam’s Buffalo Tours
HO CHI MINH CITY: Community volunteer tours such as a 16-day stay in the Vietnam Friendship Village and cultural treks including a six-day Hill Tribe Discovery adventure have propelled Buffalo Tours to the forefront of Vietnam’s burgeoning tourism industry and won the company’s entrepreneurial young founder a major international award.
The Pacific Asia Travel Association has named Tran Trong Kien, who ran local tours to fund his medical studies before founding Buffalo Tours in 1996, the ‘Face of the Future’.
Kien and Buffalo Tours have pioneered adventure tours in Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos, including trekking in Mai Chau, kayaking in Halong Bay and cycling from north to south Vietnam.
The adventure, cultural and community tours which have won Buffalo Tours accolades from visitors and the travel industry alike.
These include a five-day stay at the former French hill station of Sapa Retreat where guests explore local markets and meet hill tribes, the eight-day northern Cao Bang Trek through dramatic and mountainous countryside near the Chinese border, and the 15-day Vietnam Family Adventure from Ho Chi Minh city to Hanoi.
Community volunteer projects include involvement in an orphanage in Ha Nam province, assisting hill tribe villages in Mai Chau and working with Vietnamese people affected by Agent Orange in Hanoi’s Vietnam Friendship Village.
Ian Jarrett
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