Special trip to Vietnam February
 

Greetings all,

My husband, two of my adult children and I will be traveling to north Vietnam early next February. It's a special trip, because we adopted our daughter from Hanoi 22 years ago, and this will be our first trip back. My son can only be there a week, the other three of us will have two weeks. I'm looking for help with how to allocate the time. We'll want to concentrate on Hanoi and environs while my son is with us so we can get him to the airport after the first week. We'd definitely want to go out to Ninh Binh, as that's where my daughter was born. Then...we're open to whatever. Would love recommendations for both day trips from Hanoi, and perhaps 3-4 day tours (of the small and intimate variety). We'll be flying back out of Hanoi.

Thanks so much for any tips/advice/recommendations!
Lisa

Congratulations! This is a special trip. I'd suggest you spend the first week in/around Hanoi. Indeed, there is plenty to do in Hanoi, so a trip out to Ninh Binh and the rest of your time in Hanoi would work out well. No need for organized tours, you can easily do it yourself (you will need transport to Ninh Binh). Get yourselves a good guidebook and have everyone choose the places they most want to visit in Hanoi. I highly recommend the Ethnographic Museum and the Temple of Literature.

Use the guidebooks to help you decide on another area for your second week, either the HCMC area or central VN (Hoi An, Da Nang, and Hue).

If you are from the US, be aware that the visa fees have now changed. It will cost each of you about $185 between the visa approval letter and the stamping fee. These must be arranged in advance - even though the websites call this a "visa on arrival' it is not. You won't be allowed to fly to VN unless you have either the visa approval letter or a visa in your passport. And make sure that everyone's passport is good for 6 month beyond your entry date.

Have a wonderful trip.

It's wonderful to visit Viet Nam in auturm. I give you some suggest for your family as below :

Day 1 : you fly to Ha noi, you can be rest within day and enjoy Water puppet show in the affternoon, visit Old Quater at night.
Day 2 -4 : Ha Noi - Ha Long
Book 3 day 2 nights Ha Long cruise. You will be overnight on the sea and enjoy fresh sea food on cruise.
Day 4 : Ha Long - Ha Noi over night in Ha Noi
Day 5 -6 : Ha Noi - Ninh Binh to visit your adopt daughter native, you can go to Trang An, Tam Coc, Amerada resort, Cuc Phuong resort.. many beautiful landsapes.
Day7 : Ninh Binh - Ha Noi to see off your son.

You and Husband have 01 week left, let go to Sai Gon, mekong delta it is very nice. You have 3-4 day in Sai Gon if you want or change schedule to Ha Giang in the north est Viet Nam.

You should book through travel agent to get cheaper price because you can not get good price if you book directly cruise, hotel, car.. and you will not take too time to find out the service or way to move other place.

Let take time to enjoy your vacation. ^_^

The visa as Kathie suggested you.

With two weeks, besides Hanoi, you can visit other surrounding places like Halong and Ninh Binh. In Hanoi, it's worth to travel around Hanoi Old Quarter and surrounding villages like Duong Lam, Van Phuc and Bat Trang; visit Trang An and Bai Dinh in Ninh Binh. In addition, taking a cruise in Halong Bay is also a good idea.

Hi Lisa!

See my reply to Kwren post. I think you as a family would love one of the overnight crises to Bai Tu Long Bay--a quieter area of HaLong Bay.

Suggstion for an overnight trip from Hanoi : Mai Chau. (You could do it as a day trip too, but it would be a lot of car time!) Beautiful scenery, valleys, mountains. Just outside the main town, there's a hotel called Mai Chau Ecolodge (NOT Mai Chau Lodge, which is right IN town) Lots of easy walking/biking trails from there. Also, Hanoi families head there for the weekend. It's a beautiful place,. Wished I could have stayed longer.( If you decide on it, avoid weekend if possible--lots of noise around the pool and dining room!)

Ninh Binh CITY is nothing special--very busy, lots of building going on, etc. It's the outerlying areas/villages that are interesting, with their caves and sheer limestone outcroppings. Of course, the entire area has special meaning for you, as your daughter was born there.

Have a wonderful trip!

Lisap53 - for a minute I thought I was reading my own post! I'm going the end of February with my daughter who I adopted 18 years ago, and she's 22 now. We should follow each other's posts- well, by posting this I will definitely be following yours! Can't wait to see what other info both of us receive.

For a three or four day tour out of Hanoi, I'd recommend using a local agent. We used Ethnic Travel who were open to customising their standard tour, and were brilliant in all respects, guides, accomodation and driver.
Email communication was easy.

We stayed at Mai Chau Valley Lodge (the one in town) in April 2016 and thought it was great. I wrote a trip report in April 2016 which has more detail.

@kwren, have a look at the Vietnam section of my TR, and both of you, please ask any questions.

Like Sartoric we used Ethnic Travel and found them very good. In our case we wanted to go hiking so they adapted one of their standard trips to us. We started off in Mai Chau to pick up us up to stock on provision at the market and then we drove and hiked to Ninh Binh over 5 days, mostly staying in homestays. A great way to explore the countryside. Lots of photos and info on our blog https://accidentalnomads.com/category/vietnam/

One of the good things about Rtnic is that, although they have lots of standard trips, they will adapt to suit you needs so if there's rea ny special places you want o visit they will accomodate.

As for days trips from Hanoi, Perfume pagoda springs to mind. For longer trips consider, Ba Be, Sapa or maybe Ha Giang.