Cat Cat waterfall
At the bottom of the loop.
Bùi Thụy Đào Nguyên — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Jakub Hałun — CC BY 4.0 · Jakub Hałun — CC BY 4.0 · Jakub Hałun — CC BY 4.0
Cat Cat is a Hmong village about two kilometres below the centre of Sapa, settled in the mid-19th century by families who built their houses along the slope and farmed terraces of rice and maize beside them. It has become the town's most visited village, with a loop of stone paths and steps that runs down between the houses to a waterfall and stream at the bottom and climbs back up. Along the way, Hmong families keep up the crafts the village is known for: weaving cloth from cotton and hemp, dyeing it with indigo and polishing it by rolling it with a round log on a flat stone rubbed with beeswax, and working silver and copper into jewellery. Traditional houses have three rooms under roofs of sawn pơ mu wood. Near the waterfall a stage hosts performances of Hmong music and dance. The village is now run as a ticketed tourist area, with shops and costume hire along the path, so it is busier and more commercial than the villages further down the valley. Allow two to three hours: the walk down is easy, and the way back is a steady climb on steps of 45 minutes to an hour.
At the bottom of the loop.
The Hmong craft of cloth.
Roofed with pơ mu boards.
About 2 km below the centre of Sapa
It is the easiest village to reach on foot from Sapa, with a waterfall and traditional crafts, but it has become a busy tourist area. For quieter villages, head down the Muong Hoa valley.
