Hi, my husband and I are planning a month-long trip to SE Asia (Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia) in February 2018. I've seen some very positive reviews of Selective Asia and some interesting sample trips on their website. But haven't seen anything very recent about them. Has anyone used them in the past couple of years? Are there other travel groups you'd recommend instead? We've already booked international flights with miles, but we'd like to get help with internal flights, hotels, and guides. Would be great to get advice.

IMO, travelling to 3 countries just in a month is too rushed - Less is more. Vietnam and Cambodia will fit well in a month.

I have never used Selective Asia but do use website a lot to determine weather patterns in SE Asia as it is one of the best sources around. I think they are similar to Audley Travel whom we used many years ago who were very good, but quite expensive.

Organising everything yourself is not at all difficult and will prove a lot cheaper. I generally used someone like kayak.com to research flights and then book online direct with the airlines. Booking.com are good for hotels and most can be booked with free cancellation up to 24 hours before. For luxury / chain hotels it is sometime cheaper to book direct on the hotels website.

Guides can usually be arranged by your accomodation on arrival but in many places, are not really necessary. The same with local transport.

In some places, say for trekking or for more remote areas then local operators ( which overseas operators like Selective and Audley will outsource to anyway) will be much more cost effective and will take the strain out of the logistics etc. In Vietnam, people like Ethnic Travel, Custom Vietnam Travel - just avoid any who suggest their own services on this forum.

The first step is to devise an itinerary that meets your needs and interests. There are many here that will help with this if you provide some basic info on your interests, budget and style of travel. If you do use a tour operator make sure they don’t try to pack too much in to the time available.

One month is plenty of time to cover the highlights of those countries but you will need to be selective on what you want to see.







One month is plenty of time to see the highlights of those countries and plenty of people would cover all three countries in that time.

Crellston is quite right, you can easily book everything yourselves. Companies that are located in Europe, North America or Australia will contract out services to local agencies and charge you as much as double what a local agency would charge. So if you want someone else to do the booking, use a local agency in SE Asia, such Tonkin (located in Hanoi) or Custom Vietnam Travel or one of the other well-recommended agencies.

I don't use guides in these places, preferring to read about the places before i go. The one place you might want a guide is for the temples of Angkor. Do buy Dawn Rooney's book, Angkor: A Guide to Cambodia's Wondrous Temples to prepare for you visit to Siem Reap.

We had a wonderful experience with Selective Asia when we went to Vietnam and Cambodia