Genuine Vietnam 15 Day tour

Once you have arrived at Tan Son Nhat Airport, locate the waiting driver and transfer into the city, where your hotel awaits. Check into your hotel and enjoy free time in Ho Chi Minh City. You may want to check out some of the attractions or, if it’s your first time in Southeast Asia, you might want to get used to the pace of life here by relaxing with a Vietnamese coffee.

We start the first full day of your 15 day in Vietnam  with breakfast at the hotel, before the driver comes to pick you up at 08:00. The drive to Cu Chi Tunnels will follow this, and we will learn more about the unbelievable 250km network of snaking passages on a tour of its insides. After a quick introduction, we will be able to explore some of the tunnels at length, finding weapon storages, hospitals, cooking facilities and more within.

Lunch will be served here before we head back to Ho Chi Minh City. Once we have returned, we start the city tour of Saigon, which had its name changed to that of the famous hero of Vietnam after the city was toppled at the end of the Vietnam War. We can see where this exact event happened, at the Reunification Palace, before moving onto the War Remnants Museum to find out more.

We proceed to the buildings of the French colonists, who for some years claimed Saigon as the capital of their Indochina empire. During this time, they constructed buildings such as Notre Dame Cathedral and the Saigon Central Post Office, which we will walk around before heading back to the hotel and ending the city tour here.

We begin today at 08:00 am when the driver will arrive at your hotel and we will start your day trip to the beautiful and ancient Mekong Delta.

Once we arrive, we delve straight into Cai Be floating market, a lively space for vendors and buyers where business is conducted from boats atop the Mekong River. We will cruise around here on our own boat for a while, finding great deals on food, clothes, electronics and souvenirs, all while taking in the grandeur of the scene in which we float. 

After this, we head onto land and visit some local workshops on foot. These humble places utilise the ever-present rice and coconut of the Mekong Delta to make food such as rice paper, pop-rice and coconut candy. We head deeper onto land after this and find soy sauce and rice crackers being made, along with workshops devoted to creating materials and tools from the husks of coconuts.

Lunch will follow this, after which we continue our explorations of the luxuriant Mekong Delta by rowboat. We pass more idyllic scenery of wooden houses and nipa palm, with coconut trees rising high above us and the very pleasant atmosphere of these languid backwaters all around. We will pay our last visit to a fruit orchard to learn of the exotic and unique fruits growing in Vietnam’s deep south.

We take the drive back to Ho Chi Minh City. End of Mekong Delta Boat Trip and you will have the rest of the evening to enjoy the sparkling metropolis of Vietnam.

Savour your last breakfast in the south of Vietnam before our driver comes to take you to the airport. You will catch your flight to Da Nang after this, where another driver will collect you and drive you for 45 minutes down the coastal road to Hoi An.

In Hoi An, you can check into your hotel and enjoy exploring this incredibly vibrant town at your leisure.

Take breakfast in your hotel in beautiful Hoi An. As we reach a third of the way through our 15-day tour of genuine Vietnam, we will discover the rural enclaves of the country to find how locals make their living off the land.

The guide will arrive with bicycles and we will start our easy cycle into the surrounds of Hoi An, passing colourful buildings and stretching rice paddies along the way. After half an hour, we arrive to Tra Que, where we will be greeted by luxuriant sights of thriving tropical plants.

Here, we will experience Vietnamese farming firsthand, as we help the farmers to plough, plant, fertilise, water and harvest. This is a great chance to learn about the daily life of a Vietnamese farmer and enjoy the peaceful atmosphere that comes with it.

Following this, we have a rest at the gorgeous house of our farmer’s family before helping them to cook dinner, using some of the fresh fruits and vegetables collected by us. Sit down with the family and enjoy the tastes of your own rewards, served in the form of local dishes such as Nem Rán (spring rolls) and Bánh Xeo (crispy shrimp pancakes).

Let the food digest before bidding farewell to our friendly hosts and heading back to Hoi An via bicycle or car. The rest of your time in Hoi An is free time, so maybe you would like to explore the Ancient Town, where there are 21 beautiful sites of much historical importance.

Hoi An is a place of much enchantment and intrigue, so filling your free time with something to do will not be hard. Start with breakfast at the hotel, then maybe head to the beach to enjoy some of Vietnam’s best coastal attractions. Cua Dai and An Bang beaches provide wonderful sands, but for true tranquility, visitors can spend a full day on the beaches of the Cham Islands.

Enjoy breakfast at the hotel and your last few hours in Hoi An before the driver arrives to transfer you to Da Nang airport. We will be spending the final week of your trip in the resplendent north of Vietnam, where the natural scenery of the country reaches its peak.

Once arrived in Hanoi, your new driver will take you from the airport to your hotel in the capital’s central Old Quarter district. Relax at the hotel or take the opportunity to explore the cultural heart of Vietnam by your own devices.

Take breakfast in the hotel as you prepare yourself for the full-day Hanoi city tour, starting when the driver arrives at your hotel lobby. We begin at the Ho Chi Minh Complex, which features many attractions relating to the former president and hero of Vietnam during the 20th century. We visit the mausoleum which houses his body, the museum and the beautifully simple stilt house where he used to live. We also pay visits to the colonial French Presidential Palace as well as the ancient One Pillar Pagoda – now an iconic site of the city.

After this, we move southwards to the Temple of Literature, a Confucian university that has been a mainstay of Hanoi for 60 years after it became the capital, in 1010. We walk around its verdant gardens and the beautiful architecture of its temple buildings, noting the gigantic stone turtles bearing the names of all past graduates over its nearly 1000 years of history.

We have a local lunch after this before proceeding to one of two museums. We can either visit Hoa Lo Prison, where first Vietnamese and then American soldiers were detained throughout the First Indochina and American wars, or we can head to the Vietnam Museum of Ethnology, where the colourful assets of Vietnam’s 53 ethnic minority groups are explained.

Making our way back to the Old Quarter, we finish off the tour with a walk around the lake and the bustling centre. This is one of the most historically rich places in the country and a stroll through will unravel some of the layers of history caked onto the beautiful buildings here. We end the tour at your hotel.

Notes: The Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum is closed on Fridays and between the months of September and November. If your city tour falls during these times, we will simply explore the attractions outside of the building. The Vietnam Museum of Ethnology is closed on Mondays, so if doing the tour on this day, we will visit Hoa Lo Prison Museum instead.

Enjoy the filling breakfast in your hotel before the driver arrives to begin the scenic ride to Sapa in the far north of the country. The drive is six hours, including rest stops and scenic stops of incredible natural beauty.

We reach Sapa at about 13:00 and recharge with a delicious lunch, served in the highly picturesque hill town. We will check into the hotel and take some time to relax before we stretch our legs with the simple trek to Ma Tra village. This will pass some breath-taking views of Sapa’s iconic rice terrace and limestone mountains scenery, a scene speckled with the colourful clothes of farmers from different ethnic minorities.

Upon arriving at Ma Tra Village, we find the wonderful stilt homes of some such ethnic minorities, mainly those belonging to the H’mong and Red Dao. We can get a better understanding of the local life here by talking to the villagers and hearing of their distinctive customs. Our driver will be waiting for us here, so we will take the drive back after we are finished speaking with the locals.

After breakfast, you have free time to enjoy Sapa as you wish. This can be done at Ham Rong Mountain, where steps through the woodland eventually end at the low peak, which provides excellent views over Sapa and its background of limestone karsts.

At about 14:00, your guide will meet you at the hotel and we will trek to Lao Chai. From this beautiful village, we start our trek to another one, Ta Van Village – home of the Giay ethnic minority and their wonderfully welcoming customs. Through perfect scenery of rice paddies cascading down verdant valleys, we reach the village and relax by chatting to the locals.

Our homestay is a traditional wooden stilt house, looking onto a gorgeous view of the nature beyond. Our welcoming hosts will show us the way to cook local food and if you want, you can help them to prepare for dinner. Our evening meal will be of a lovely local flavour, served under a blanket of stars.

Share breakfast with your friendly hosts before enjoying free time in the village and beyond. This is the perfect opportunity to head to Fansipan Mountain, the tallest in Indochina, reachable via a cable car that runs to its peak.

The driver will pick us up from the homestay and take us back to Sapa Town. You will have free time for visiting Fansipan Peak in your free time. Have lunch on your own then you will drive back to Hanoi in the afternoon after your lunch time ( Lunch on your own payment). We arrive back in the capital in the late afternoon. End of Sapa Tours for 3 Day.

Note: The following itinerary is merely an example. Your exact itinerary may change slightly depending on the cruise that you select during your booking with us.

Eat breakfast at your hotel and prepare for pick-up from the driver. Today will be the start of the most anticipated activity of 15 day tour in Vietnam, a 3-day, 2-night trip around Vietnam’s most famous asset – Halong Bay.

We begin with a transfer across the Red River Delta, ending at Tuan Chau Harbour, where you will board the cruise. Enjoy lunch and the very first few hours of our sailing, which you can spend up on the sundeck or in the cabin below.

After hours of gliding through the picture-perfect seascape of limestone mountains, caves and beaches, we make our first stop. At Luon Cave, you will be able to explore the majesty of a hidden lake, lying on the other side of a tunnel through the mountain. We head through the tunnel in kayaks or on sampan boats, observing the beauty of limestone stalactites and an obscured lagoon with cliff walls on every side.

We return to the cruise after this to take in views of the perfect sunset behind the beautiful scene of Halong Bay. This is accompanied by happy hour at the bar and a party on the sundeck. A gorgeous moonlit dinner and an evening of serenity will follow this.

Rise early and head to the sundeck for tai chi. There will be a beginners’ session held up here in the morning light of the bay. Follow this with breakfast in the restaurant and the transfer to the smaller, but still well-equipped day boat.

We begin our excursions in some of the quieter areas of Halong Bay, starting at Me Cung Cave, one of the oldest of its kind here. We explore the interior with the help and knowledge of our guide, who will point out all of the interesting features in the limestone formations. There is a beautiful local legend attached to the more prominent rock forms, which we will hear about along with their interesting geology.

We return to the boat for lunch, during which we cruise lazily over to our next destination. Around the area of Dau Go, we will be able to climb into kayaks and paddle through this utterly peaceful sea, enjoying the sights of towering limestone mountains without the threat of overcrowding from other cruise ships or their passengers.

We re-join the main cruise in the late afternoon and savour another sunset party on the top deck. Another glorious dinner follows this, as does our final evening of relaxation.

Wake up early once more for the final full day of your trip in Vietnam. It will start with sunrise and tai chi on the sundeck, along with breakfast served just afterwards in the dining room.

Our final stop of the Halong Bay tour is to one of its most famous sites, Titop Beach, with gorgeous white sand, jungle and a placid sea. We can take time here to relax or swim, as well as climb the mountain in the middle of the island to get a panoramic view over Halong Bay from the top.

We return to the cruise for the final time and check out of the cabins. Eat your final brunch and disembark at the harbour. End of 3 day Halong Bay cruise, you will get back to your bus and to Hanoi, where we will arrive in the late afternoon.

Your final evening is yours to do with as you wish. It is your last one, so make sure to absorb as much of the magic of Vietnam as possible!

On the last day of your 2-week Vietnam holiday, you can enjoy breakfast and your final few hours in Vietnam at your leisure.

The driver will arrive at your hotel with about 3 hours to go until your flight. Take the transfer to the airport and board your onwards flight to your next destination.

This ends the Genuine Vietnam 15 day tour. Thank you so much for joining us and we hope that you will come back to our wonderful country in the future.