Three weeks in Vietnam, an itinerary

Just in case you are thinking of visiting Vietnam and don’t know what to see or do, here’s our three week itinerary.  It includes all of the highlights from our six week tour back in 2016 and none of the things we found a bore. 

Our style of travel on this tour was mid-range. It cost us just over £3,000 for the three of us, so about £1,000 each for all of the accommodation, internal travel and tours. Our flights were on top of this. We used Vietnam Impressive to book our train travel and a few of the tours. The rest we did on booking.com, TripAdvisor and via the hotels we stayed in. It is very easy for Westerners to travel around Vietnam but be polite and learn to say a few words and the Vietnamese will love you!

I’ve included links to reviews of the places we stayed and tours below Xx

HCM Day 1
Arrive Ho Chi Minh. Used Visa on arrival letter – would NOT recommend this, get a visa in advance as we had to wait almost two hours at the airport, not ideal after a long flight.
Stay: Chill Suites, 212/ A67, Nguyen Trai Street,  – was grim so we checked out after one night and checked in to Yen Trang 2, very basic but clean, huge room and great location with fabulous staff.

HCM Day 2
Ma Arrived
Stay: Yen Trang 2

HCM Day 3
Relaxed and explored locally, discovering the delicious Nonla Guys fusion restaurant.
PM: Private Ho Chi Minh City Street food by night with Urban Adventures, a great tour.
STAY: Yen Trang 2

HCM Day 4
AM: Sightseeing Tour of Saigon by Motorbike (VietnamCrazyTours.com), flipping awesome!
STAY: Yen Trang 2

Mekong Day 5
TNK Travel DISCOVERY MEKONG DELTA. This is a basic tour but a good one nonetheless. Accommodation left a bit to be desired! Arrive in My Tho, visit Vinh Trang pagoda and take a boat ride along the river, view the stilt houses and the fruit plantation along the river bank. Tortoise island for lunch in the orchard. Boat ride to An Khanh –in Ben Tre. Short cycling tour then enjoy local fruit & honey tea while listening to Southern Vietnamese folk music. Proceed to Can Tho. Overnight at standard 2* hotel – double yuck!

Mekong Day 6
Take a sampan trip to explore the picturesque tributaries of the lower Mekong river then proceed to Cai Rang floating market (and Phong Dien market is optional) See how Vietnamese vermicelli soup is made. Wander around the village and experience crossing a “Monkey bridge”. Visit the orchard garden before having lunch. Proceed to Chau Doc to visit Tra Su, getting to the wild birds sanctuary, rowing slowly by small boat to discover the arrays of splendid canals deep into the forest – these used to be splendid canals but they are  clearing aiming for more tourists and were brutally carved new waterways, once they bed in I am sure they will be lovely. Trung Nguyen hotel, standard twin sharing room – YUCK!

Mekong/HCM Day 7
All day After breakfast, take a nice boat trip through the floating village to visit a fish farm. Visit the Cham minority with their traditional weaving village – this was a pointless trip to a shop, no village and very disappointing.
Trip back to Ho Chi Minh city, drop-off at hotel at about 5pm.
STAY: Yen Trang 2

HCM/Train Day 8 hotel booked night of 15th so we can use all day
AM: Sightseeing and street food tour of Saigon by Motorbike, (another awesome VietnamCrazyTours tour)
1945 SE4 train to Da Nang, 4 berth soft sleeper. We don’t book the more expensive tourists sleepers as we find this one just fine but we do book all four berths so we are in our own cabin. NOTE: if you join the train anywhere other than the start the bedding is NOT changed, so use a sarong or scarf to cover it.

Hoi An Day 9
1230 Arrive Da Nang
Stay: Vinh Hung 2, 121 Ba Trieu, Cam Pho, Hoi An, +84 235 3863 717 – lovely hotel with a wonderful pool! (except we later discovered we had almost £660 in Indonesian Rupiah stolen while here so not a recommendation any more)

Hoi An Day 10
PM: Private Hoi An: Urban Adventure food Tour. Not the best food tour we have done, very few stops and a lacklustre guide.
Stay: Vinh Hung 2

Hoi An Day 11
Morning trip My Son, lovely Cham temple complex.
Stay: Vinh Hung 2

Hoi An Day 12
Morning trip Marble Mountains, really stunning Mountain cave and temple complex.
Stay: Vinh Hung 2

Hoi An Day 13
AM: Thuan Tinh Island Cooking Class – absolutely fabulous cooking class which I wrote about here.
Stay: Vinh Hung 2

Hoi An Day 14
PM: AO show Lune Performing Center Hoi An for JHubz’s Birthday from Ma, was brilliant, loud! Vibrant and in the most beautiful little circular arena.
Stay: Vinh Hung 2

Hoi An/Train Day 15 JHubz Birthday!
1249 Da Nang train to Hanoi, SE4, 4 berth soft sleeper. Our cabin was filthy but we borrowed a broom, cleaned it out and we always travel with our own sheets for the train 😉

Hanoi Day 16
0450 Arrive Hanoi.
PM: Small group food tour with HA Food Tours – really great tour and only four of us! We were introduced to several new foods with was awesome.
Stay: Hanoi HM Boutique, 3 Hang Dau, Hoan Kiem, Hanoi, +84 243 2668 586. The hotel is in the old quarter in a great location. The bed is comfy and it is clean, would look for a hotel with a pool next time though.

Hanoi Day 17
PM: Hanoi Easy Rider motorbike tour of Hanoi, really great tour although not as good as the Ho Chi Minh ones!
Stay: Hanoi HM Boutique

Hanoi Day 18
Went to the Fine Art Museum and KOTO, a social enterprise restaurant
Stay: Hanoi HM Boutique

Hanoi Day 19
All Day Hoa Lua Tam Coc, Hanoi Easy Riders. I would do a normal tour next time. 
Stay: Hanoi HM Boutique

Hanoi Day 20
Stay: Hanoi HM Boutique

Hanoi/FLY Day 21
Leave Vietnam

I would probably add a day trip to Hue and a few days in Sapa to make it perfect.

We discovered motorbike tours this time, which we absolutely loved (including my seventy one year young mother) and did four of them in the end. We enjoyed some sort of tour almost every day, changed hotels twice and tours a few times, which is why we always try and book things with free cancellation.