History
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A roadside marker for National Highway 4C, the main alignment across the plateau.
The roads used for the modern loop largely follow the plateau highway widely known as the "Happiness Road" (Con đường Hạnh Phúc), built from 1959 to 1965 to connect Ha Giang City with plateau districts including Dong Van and Meo Vac. The route is commonly described as roughly 184–185 kilometers and running from Ha Giang City through districts such as Quan Ba, Yen Minh, Dong Van, and Meo Vac, with National Highway 4C treated as the modern alignment across the plateau. North Vietnam's leader Ho Chi Minh referred to the project as the "Happiness Road" in 1961.
Accounts of the road-building effort describe travel in the plateau districts before construction as relying largely on footpaths and packhorse tracks, followed by extensive manual work in steep terrain. VietnamPlus coverage describes participation by youth volunteer brigades and local labor mobilized from ethnic minority communities along the route. The road was started in 1959 with participation by volunteers and civilian laborers from 16 ethnic groups—including the Hmong, Tày, Dao, Nùng, Pu Péo, and Lô Lô. Ministry coverage tied to the 2009 national-monument recognition of the Mã Pí Lèng landscape describes the pass worksite as sustaining large-scale manual rock cutting and states that more than 1,000 youth volunteers and local residents were mobilized at the Mã Pí Lèng site, with the pass segment taking nearly two years to complete.
