My husband and I will be in Hanoi mid Feb and would like to see more of northern Vietnam (we've spent quite a bit of time in the south and used to live in Cambodia). Sapa is on our list but I've seen a few posts saying that it can be crowded (in February?) and wanted to enquire whether that would still be a good choice. We're not backpackers (yup, a wee bit older) so don't want to be roughing it with challenging bus rides and are willing to pay a bit more for a bit more comfort so recommendations for transport would be appreciated.

Other than Sapa, what else should we add to our list? We'll probably have about 7 to 10 days and prefer quiet, beautiful scenery with interesting local neighbourhoods rather than touristed spots.

As far as comfortable travel is concerned , there is no need to rough it on buses (indeed I would avoid public buses completely except for short journeys. In is relatively inexpensive to hire a car and driver and guide for a private tour and you can pretty much choose to go where you want. In some of the more scenic places, the accommodation will often be in homestays which are a great experience but certainly not the height of comfort. We took one trip with https://ethnictravel.com.vn and found the to be very good and very receptive to doing exactly what we wanted. On that trip we started off in the Mai Chau Valley which does have some very nice places to stay and work our way through the Black River Valley and Pu Long (home stays) to Ninh Binh. To avoid the crowds in mai Chau, dont go at weekends and stay out in the valley rather than in the main villages. The middle part of that tour was all homestays as there were no hotels. Ninh Binh has a wide selection of accommodation.

I confess Sapa, scenic though it undoubtedly is, not for me twenty odd years ago I found it very over touristed with lots off quite aggressive touts in the town. It is of course possible to get some peace and quiet once away form the main population centres.

Other place worth a look could be the Ha Giang Loop (which now gets quite busy with backpackers on motorbikes but is very beautiful. Ba Be Lakes is stunning and as far as I recall only sees mostly local tourists .

if to want to move around a bit then we once did the "Dien Bien Phu" from Hanoi to Sapa to DBP and back to Hanoi via Son La and Mai Chau. Ethnic travel or any of the other operators in the old quarter of Hanoi will sort all of those out for you.

A few photos of Ninh bins and the black river/pu long tour in our blog @ https://accidentalnomads.com/category/vietnam/page/4/

Many thanks for the feedback.

February is cold, so tourists are NOT flooding Sapa;

7 to 10 days is a minimum to visit the north.: Hanoi 2 days, Halong Bay 2 days, then TA.M COC, "Halong Bay on land", 2 days, then NIGHT rain NINH BINH-Danang + taxi 35 km Danang-to very charming Hoi An. Forget the South, much less exciting

Has anyone visited Long Coc?

I haven’t as it didn’t really fit with any of the other places we were visiting during our numerous trips to the north. It is still on the list as it is a prime tea growing area in the country and I have an interest in tea growing due to family involvement in tea growing back in the day.

Years ago we did visit the tea growing areas around Phonsali and the Bolavens Plateau in Laos - still using some of the tea to this day!

if you are considering a visit, try to make it during the harvest time

When is harvest time? ...asks this ignorant tea lover.

The tea harvest I think is in December in the cool dry season. If heading that way then it would be nice to check out the rice planting/harvesting seasons. Both would be great to witness esp. the rice terraces

Thanks for your feedback. We've spent time in Hanoi before (and my brother lives there so we're visiting him) and also have been to Halong Bay, Ninh Binh and Hoi An. This time we're focusing more on Sapa and that region so wanted to see if there were any other spots worth visiting that we might be missing.