Pu Hoat Nature Reserve

In the west of Nghệ An rises a mountain range that not many people mention. Yet it plays one of the most important roles in the ecosystem of the whole region.

That range is Pù Hoạt. Its highest peak rises above 2,400 meters. Up in the high country, deep in a forest remote from any settlement, stand sa mu dầu trees that have lived through many centuries.

The nature reserve lies in the Quế Phong area of Nghệ An and spreads across nine communes. In 2013, the provincial government of Nghệ An turned the Quế Phong protection forest board into the board of this nature reserve. The whole area it manages is more than 85,000 hectares. Of that, more than 34,000 hectares is special-use forest. Special-use forest is the class of forest that Vietnam keeps mainly for conservation and scientific research. More than 51,000 hectares is protection forest.

The reserve is one of three core zones of the Western Nghệ An Biosphere Reserve. A biosphere reserve is a UNESCO-recognized area where nature is protected and the people living there keep working the land. UNESCO recognized this one in 2007. The other two core zones are Pù Mát and Pù Huống. The title does not belong to Pù Hoạt alone. It belongs to all three core zones together, and it reflects how rich and how closely linked the whole region is.

Pù Hoạt holds things that few people know about.

Along the border forests, where the land meets Laos, there are belts of woodland in which pơ mu and sa mu dầu trees grow from a height of 1,000 meters upward. A website called Pù Hoạt Online records a group of 56 sa mu dầu trees here. The Vietnam Association for Nature and Environment Conservation has recognized them as Vietnam Heritage Trees.

Each of the 56 trees is a living witness that has stood through many centuries. Their greatest value is that they are still there, still alive, and still telling the story of the old forest to the generations that follow.

The Seven Tiers Waterfall lies at the end of the village of Hủa Mương, in Hạnh Dịch commune. It is inside the core zone of the nature reserve. The Nghệ An newspaper describes it as a group of falls stretching about 7 kilometers, with seven large tiers of water and many smaller falls between them. A site called Sinh Quyển Nghệ An also records where the falls lie, and it describes a group of falls, not a single one. That explains the name. The seven tiers are not seven steps standing side by side. They are seven large falls spread along a stretch of forest.

The same newspaper has recorded accidents here, in which people went missing or died. The ground is wet rock and slippery moss, and the current is strong. These are what make the waterfall both beautiful and powerful, in the way of truly wild nature.

Pù Hoạt hides other places that are not widely known. One is the Bình Chuẩn area. Another is a stream called Khe Cố. Two more are the falls of Canh Lình and Canh Mò. The last is the Nga My area. Each name is a stretch of mountain forest waiting in silence.

Pù Hoạt is not a mass tourist area in the usual sense. The mountains are high, the forest is thick, the roads are long, and few people know the place. Perhaps that is exactly what keeps forests like Pù Hoạt intact.

There, on the slopes that face Laos, the 56 sa mu dầu trees still stand. Quietly. As if they had never needed anyone to know their names in order to go on living.