Hi all,
Me and the missus are going to Vietnam for just over three weeks in late October to mid November, so I thought I'd post a thread asking for any suggestions and reccommendations from those here who have visited Vietnam before, as neither of us have.
I've got a rough idea of where we're going to visit and will list our general itinery below, but would welcome any suggestions of other must-visit places I haven't listed, or any recommendations of things to do/places to stay/places to eat and drink in the places I'm planning on going to:
So, we land in HCMC and fly to Hanoi the following day.
We then plan to get the night train to Sapa from Hanoi, stay for a few days, then get the night train back to Hanoi.
Next, we were planning to do the Halong Bay boat tour thing, but doing really touristy expensive "tours" ain't really our thing...luckily I've found what seems like a pleasing alternative, Quan Lan Island: https://www.google.co.uk/#q=quan+lan+island To get there you can take a slow local ferry boat through the exact same scenery as on the tours, yet you end up on a relatively unspoiled island instead of on a boatload of tourists. Anyone been there? Not much info online, but from what I've read it sounds decent.
Then we go back to Hanoi, and could maybe squeeze a couple of days at Ninh Binh, which looks pretty nice.
Next, we plan to fly to Da Nang and spend a few days in Central vietnam, visiting Hoi An, Hue, the Hai Van Pass and Lang Co. Now, Central Vietnam isn't recommended at th time of year we're visiting due to a fairly high chance of typhoons, so we're just going to have to see what the weather is doing at the time and make a decision to visit or not. Anyone got any alternative suggestions for this portion of the trip? Maybe some places inland away from the coast, or places worth visiting in Southern Vietnam?
After this we plan to fly back to HCMC for a couple of days before we fly home. Would like to do a Mekong Delta Boat trip, any recommendations on tour providers?
So just to recap:
HCMC>Hanoi
Hanoi>Sapa>Hanoi
Hanoi>Quan Lan>Hanoi
(Potentially) Hanoi>Ninh Binh>Hanoi
Hanoi>Hoi An
Hoi An>Hue
Hue>HCMC
Thanks in advance for any helpful tips and suggestions, I shall do a photo thread of the trip on my return.