A land of staggering natural beauty and cultural mix, of dynamic mega-cities and hill-tribe villages, Vietnam is both exotic and compelling.

New Year was holiday’s were approaching and we were still juggling to finalize the place – where to visit, on arrival visa, availability of good hotels etc etc. Then the name came in mind as Vietnam – near to Philippines (which is my current base location), a beautiful place, with friendly people, and more importantly we found the availability in Intercontinental hotel. It was 3 nights stay and we enjoyed our stay with beautiful ambiance and helpful staff.

Visa for Vietnam– It is a very easy process. Apply online with your travel details. They will email you the confirmation of eVisa. On arrival at the Vietnam airport, show the confirmation letter and get the visa stamp. Visa fee is 45 USD per person (always check online as it change time to time), the will scan your passport and grant a Visa of one month.

There are many tours available which combine few near by places. Some of the places are more than 4 hours (going and back) from Hanoi city. We booked our tour from Viator. There are various types of companies listed, do read the review before booking your tour package.

HANOI CITY DAY TOUR

First day was very hectic, as we reached Hanoi city at 1 am in morning, and Hotel by 2 PM. Our tour Pickup from hotel for City tour was at 8 am in morning. Hanoi is beautiful place with its old french architecture. It is a very old city, but now they are making new buildings and renovating their old buildings. This was 8 hours tour which includes all the main attractions of the city READ MORE… 

HALONG BAY DAY TOURS

Halong bay is must see place in Vietnam travels. We took one day tour to Halong Bay, there are Cruise tour available for 2 days and 1 night. It will be a small cruise of around 5 to 6 rooms, which will give you experience of sea cruising. Since, we did not had that much time and we wanted to achieve more in less time, so we decided to go for day tour to Halong Bay. And, there are only few who choose staying option there, most of the tourist were for day tour READ MORE… 

HOA LU AND TAM COC DAY TOUR

Hoa Lu was in my bucket list, we booked this tour a day before only. And we were lucky to get the tickets, as most of tours were full already. It was one of the great place in Vietnam with beautiful landscapes. The travel time is around 3.5 hours going and back. These tour companies combine near by places in their tour. And you will have chance to visit all those places within the time frame. Whereas, if you are planning to visit these places your own, in that case, you can hire a taxi and visit these places. It was our third day of Vietnam visit READ MORE…. 

We kept our 4th day free for shopping and not to miss water puppet show. It was really hard to get tickets for water puppet show. when we tried in the afternoon the show was full. Then in evening again we tried and got lucky to get our tickets. It was an amazing show with good music, great coordination and colorful puppets. There are plenty of shops nearby for shopaholics .  Bargaining options are available in these shops , so tourist should check them.

It was indeed a good new year vacation in Vietnam and definitely a much bigger vacation for future. For more details you can log in to their website Vietnam Tourism