Dai Yem Falls

The falls lie in the village of Vặt, in Mường Sang commune. This is part of Mộc Châu, in Sơn La. Their name carries a love story told by the Thái people of this region. The Thái are one of Vietnam's ethnic groups, and Sơn La is one of the provinces where they mainly live.

The story goes that a girl from Vặt waited day after day for her beloved to come home from the war. One day she went to the edge of the falls and slipped into the rushing water. The villagers searched for her and found only her dải yếm, the cloth band of her bodice, still caught on a tree branch beside the falls. From then on, people called the place Dải Yếm Falls. This is a folk legend, not an event in any written record. But it explains why the falls carry a name that is both lovely and sad.

The falls have two other names, Nàng Falls and Bản Vặt Falls. Official documents from Sơn La list all three, so one waterfall goes by three names.

The water's route is easy to trace. It begins in two places, the areas called Bó Co Lắm and Bo Tá Cháu. Two small streams from there join to form the Vặt Stream, which pours into the Bó Sập Stream and makes the falls. So the falls are the end of a long journey, as water runs from gullies on the high mountains down to the lower valley.

The falls are described as more than 100 meters high, in two main groups. One group has nine tiers and the other has five. From June to October, when the water is high, the roar carries from far away, and the white curtain of water is striking. In the low-water months the falls look gentler. A visitor can stand closer then and see the tiers one by one.

Across from the falls stands the glass bridge called Tình Yêu, which is the Vietnamese word for love. The bridge is almost 100 meters long. It rises more than 22 meters above the water, and it has been open to visitors since 2019. This is not an ordinary suspension bridge. Its floor is clear glass, so a walker looks straight down at the stream below. From the bridge, both faces of the falls come into view at once, from an angle that the ground never gives.

The eco-tourism area around the falls covers about 7 hectares. It is run by Pha Luông Travel Company, and it is certified as a four-star OCOP product. OCOP, short for One Commune One Product, is a national program that rates local products with stars. A footpath follows the stream, and a small market run by local Indigenous people stands just before the entrance to the falls. The area presents the food, the brocade and the weaving of the Thái people. Visitors can watch Thái women weave cloth, or taste the dishes of the region.

People from the area say the falls look their best in the early morning. When the mist is still thin, the light touches the water and small rainbows hang in front of the white curtain.

Whatever the name, this is still the place where, in the legend, a Thái girl's white dải yếm hangs on a branch for good. And the water goes on falling tier after tier, as if it had never stopped waiting.