14 best places to celebrate Lunar New Year

Want to strut your stuff in the Year of the Dog?


If you're in Hong Kong -- or Vietnam, South Korea or anywhere else in the world with a Chinese diaspora -- it's time to don that tacky red jacket, gamble until you lose and eat till you burst.


Yes, it's the Lunar New Year, or the Spring Festival. It usually lasts for 15 days from the first day of the lunar calendar (February 16 in 2018), and is the time when families get together to ring in the changes.


While most will go to any lengths to get home to see the family, for some it's a chance to travel -- if only to get away from nagging relatives and red packet-hungry colleagues and friends (in China it's customary to dispense red paper envelopes filled with money at this time of year.)


But traveling doesn't have to mean forgoing the festivities. Here are 14 destinations where you can celebrate Lunar New Year in your own way.



Sha Tin Racecourse, Hong Kong

Not just for professional punters, Sha Tin's Chinese New Year race is a family-friendly activity.


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Gambling is as close to a religion as it gets in Hong Kong and Lunar New Year is an auspicious time to try your luck.


Held on the third day (February 18, 2018) of the Spring Festival, the Chinese New Year Race -- hosted at Sha Tin Racecourse -- is one of the most popular race days of the year.


Even if you're not passionate about horse racing, the racecourse hosts live performances, a talk from a feng shui master and lucky draws to keep you occupied.


February 18, free entry for tourists; first race at 12:30 p.m.; Sha Tin Racecourse, Sha Tin, Hong Kong



Quang Ba Flower Market, Hanoi, Vietnam




One essential must-have for Vietnam's Lunar New Year, or Tet, is a bunch of flowers and Hanoi's Quang Ba flower market works at a frenetic pace during the festival.


Shoppers seek out the most eye-catching bouquets (usually peach blossom or ochna integerrima, the bright yellow blossom favored during Tet) amid the whirr and screech of the city's ubiquitous motorcycles, all transporting bright bunches of flowers on their pillions.


The sights and sounds mixed with the fragrance of street food makes for a heady New Year sensual overload.


Quang Ba Flower Market, Au Co Street, Tay H, Hanoi, Vietnam; open daily from about 3 a.m.



Nuanquan Town, Hebei province, China





Steel yourself. Nuanquan welcomes the New Year with a shower of molten metal.


Lintao Zhang/Getty Images AsiaPac/Getty Images


With a population of less than 20,000 -- making it pretty much a tiny hamlet by Chinese standards -- Nuanquan usually flies below the tourist radar for most of the year.


But on the 15th day of the Spring Festival, the sleepy town literally fires up with a spectacular grassroots "firework" display that has been UNESCO-listed as one of China's great examples of intangible cultural heritage.


The da shuhua (translated as "beating tree flowers") tradition is believed to be more than 500 years old and culminates in a jaw-dropping display where the local blacksmith hurls ladles of molten iron at the city gates, producing a shower of sparks.

HALAMAN SELANJUTNYA:

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