Vietnam, booked properly.
Which Ha Long boat is worth the overnight. Whether Cu Chi is better in the morning. What a Hanoi food walk actually feeds you. We read the reviews so your two weeks are not spent guessing.
The days a Vietnam trip gets built around.
The bay, the tunnels, the delta, the karst rivers, the food walks and the mountain treks. Most itineraries are four of these six, and the booking you make decides how each one goes.
Ha Long Bay: how long do you give it?
Every Ha Long trip →
The expressway put the bay within a morning of Hanoi, so a day boat now works. A night on board buys the part everyone remembers: the anchorage after the day fleet leaves. These three are the boats the most people come back from happy.
Out and back from Hanoi in a day
Picked up early, on the water by midday, a cave and a kayak or a swim, back in the Old Quarter for a late dinner. The bay without moving your bags.
One night, two days, a quiet anchorage
The boats spread out and moor for the night, which is when the bay stops feeling like a car park. Sunrise on the sun deck is the part people describe afterwards.
Lan Ha, Cat Ba and a paddle through the arches
East of the main bay the water is emptier and the operators are smaller. Kayaks go through the limestone arches into lagoons the big junks cannot reach.
Hanoi is best eaten sitting down on a plastic stool.
The Old Quarter rewards a guide for one evening and then leaves you alone. Bun cha at lunch, egg coffee upstairs somewhere, a train an arm's length from the coffee tables, and a jeep or a vintage bike to join the dots after dark.
The most-booked tours in Vietnam.
Every review →Ranked by how many travellers have been and rated them. The tunnels, the delta, a Hanoi jeep and the Ninh Binh long day sit at the top of this country by a distance.
1
Cu Chi Tunnels Tour from HCM City – Morning or Afternoon
Cu Chi Tunnels from Ho Chi Minh City with District 1 pickup, English guide, up to 2 hours underground, and optional AK-47 shooting.
From · $15
Read our review →
2
Hanoi Jeep Tour: Food, Culture and Fun by Vietnam Army Jeep
from $55
3
Mekong Delta Tour with Sampan Journey
from $16
4
Ho Chi Minh City Street Food Tour & Sightseeing By Motorbike
from $28
5
Full-Day Ninh Binh Highlights Tour from Hanoi
from $79
6
Cu Chi Tunnels-Tapioca Small Group Tour Morning or Afternoon
from $14
7
Ha Long Bay Day Cruise – Swimming, Meal, Kayaking
from $41
8
Cu Chi Tunnels and Mekong Delta Signature Tour
from $33
9
Mekong Delta Guided Tour from Ho Chi Minh City
from $18
Hoi An asks for three days and gets away with five.
The old town closes to traffic and fills with paper lanterns; on the fourteenth night of each lunar month the electric lights go off altogether. Days go to the coconut palms, the cooking schools and a bicycle ride to the beach.
What a day out in Vietnam costs.
Every tour we have reviewed, sorted by price. Vietnam is the country where the cheap option is often the good one, so read up before you spend.
Tunnel tickets, water puppets, a lantern class, a basket boat, most food walks. The everyday of a Vietnam trip.
Full-day trips: Ninh Binh, the delta, a Ha Long day boat, a jeep evening, a cooking school with the market first.
Overnight boats, private cars with a driver, multi-day loops and the trips that carry your bags between provinces.
Three things Vietnam does that nobody copied.
Cooking schools and boat trips exist everywhere. Puppets performed waist-deep in water, coracles woven from bamboo and coffee thickened with egg yolk are Vietnamese answers to Vietnamese problems.
Water Puppetry
The stage is a pool and the puppeteers stand behind a bamboo screen in it, working the figures on long rods under the surface. It started in the flooded fields of the Red River Delta, where a submerged paddy was the only stage available, and the Hanoi theatres still play it with a live band on the side of the water.
- 1Water Puppet Show Tickets★★★★★★★★★★ 4.6 · 7,029 reviews
- 2Water Puppet Show Ticket with Hotel Delivery Add-On★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 1,554 reviews
- 3Thang Long Water Puppet Show Ticket – Skip The Line★★★★★★★★★★ 4.6 · 836 reviews
The Basket Boat
A thung chai is a round coracle of split bamboo sealed with resin, and it steers by sculling a single oar in a figure of eight. In the water-coconut palms at Cam Thanh, outside Hoi An, the boatmen spin them on the spot for fun and dig up crabs between passes.
- 1Basket Boat Ride in the Coconut Forest★★★★★★★★★★ 4.9 · 4,956 reviews
- 2Cooking Class Hoi An:Local Market, Basket Boat, Fishing & Cooking★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 3,660 reviews
- 3Mekong Delta, My Tho & Ben Tre Coconut Village★★★★★★★★★★ 4.7 · 3,304 reviews
Egg Coffee
When milk was scarce in 1940s Hanoi, a bartender whipped egg yolk with condensed milk instead and poured it over strong coffee. The result is closer to a warm dessert than a drink, and the city has never given it up. Order it hot, and take the second-floor table.
- 1Vietnamese Coffee Culture and Coffee Making Class★★★★★★★★★★ 4.9 · 4,006 reviews
- 2Hanoi Coffee Experience: 6 Brews, 9 Recipes & 3 Liquor Tastings★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 2,945 reviews
- 3Hanoi Coffee Workshop: Taste Salt, Coconut and Egg Coffee★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 1,286 reviews
Vietnam has three climates at once, so plan around your own stretch of it.
The country is 1,650 km end to end and the weather does not agree with itself. Central Vietnam takes its rain and its floods between September and December, the north gets a cold grey drizzle in late winter, and the south has a downpour most afternoons from May to October that clears in an hour. None of these cancel a good indoor booking.
Down the country, Hanoi to Saigon.
Almost everyone travels Vietnam in one direction, stopping in the same six places. This is what each stop is for, and how long it usually earns.
Hanoi
Ha Long Bay
Ninh Binh
Hue
Hoi An
Ho Chi Minh CitySaigon runs at motorbike speed and eats at street level.
Everything worth doing here is either a plate on a corner or an hour outside the city. Ride pillion with a student guide through District 4, then give a morning to the tunnels at Cu Chi and an afternoon to the delta.
- 1Cu Chi Tunnels Tour from HCM City – Morning or Afternoonfrom $15
- 2Mekong Delta Tour with Sampan Journeyfrom $16
- 3Ho Chi Minh City Street Food Tour & Sightseeing By Motorbikefrom $28
By place — north to south
By day out — what kind of day is it?
The newest Vietnam reviews.
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La Regina 2 days tour in Halong Bay & Bai Tu Long Bay – 4 star
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2 Weeks Vietnam and Cambodia – Super Saving – Amazing Experience
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2 Days Sapa Trekking In Cat Cat And Ta Van Village From Hanoi
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3-Day Ninh Binh Trip and Ha Long Bay 4-Star Cruise
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2-Days Sapa Trekking and Overnight in Tavan Village
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2-Days Sapa Tour with Fansipan Cable Car Trekking Three Village
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VIP LUXURY Sapa 2D1N -TRANSFER BY LUX LIMOUSINE CAR (Stay at 5* hotel)
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