Imagine Sapa before the hotels, the crowds, and the cable cars – that is Pu Luong. This nature reserve is Vietnam’s best-kept secret, a hidden valley where time is marked not by clocks, but by the slow turning of giant bamboo water wheels. Here, you don’t just view the rice terraces; you hike through them, sleep in traditional stilt houses on stilts, and wake up to a silence so pure you can hear the clouds moving.