Vietnam Heritage Journey 12 Days

Xin Chao!  Welcome to Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam.

When you arrive, your driver will meet you in the arrivals lobby, holding a welcome signboard with your names, and transport you directly to your hotel in the city center.

After checking in, you will have time to unwind and adjust to the speed of HCM City, which the locals still refer to as Saigon. 

 Please be aware that your travel documents include a Visa-on-Arrival letter (unless otherwise specified).  Please pack this in your carry-on luggage.  Your Visa-on-Arrival letter must be handed to Customs upon entering the country.

Overnight in Ho Chi Minh City

The morning
Following breakfast, tour guide will meet you and bring you to Cu Chi, a tiny town northwest of Ho Chi Minh City famous for its network of deep tunnels that offered shelter and an efficient source of infiltration for the Viet Cong during the last years of the Vietnam War.

When you arrive, you will see a brief introductory film from the era before tunnel exploration, the most renowned battlefields in the world. Housed living quarters, storage chambers, makeshift hospitals, kitchens, etc. This concealed network of Viet Cong tunnels is thought to span to “hundreds of miles” overall length. Though originally somewhat limited, some areas have been enlarged for visitors and you have the chance to investigate portions of the system.

These tunnels will be hot and could be claustrophobic, therefore there is a choice if you like to see from above ground.

Sample some of the primary Viet Cong Soldiers’ cuisine alongside a cassava taste accompanied with sour tea. Following your visit of the Cu Chi Tunnels, return to the city with lunch at Ben Nay restaurant along the way.

Post-lunch
Visit a few of Ho Chi Minh City’s main attractions for the rest of the day. Your tour will be customized to fit you, but we especially suggest seeing the Notre Dame Cathedral, the beautiful City Hall (Hotel De Ville), the old Opera House, the historic Rex Hotel, the Central Post Office, famous for its architecture, and Ben Thanh Market, where merchants showcase a great variety of products and handicrafts, appealing to all tastes.

Later visit the Reunification Palace and the touching War Remnants Museum for an enlightening, albeit sad, look into Vietnam’s military history and tragic past.

Before ending the day in great style with a sundowner at the summit of the Bitexco Tower, the highest structure in Vietnam, go to the atmospheric Jade Emperor Pagoda.

Overnight in Ho Chi Minh City

Meals: Breakfast, lunch

Morning

After breakfast, the guide will drive you from HCM City to Ben Tre Town in the Mekong Delta, known for its rice fields, rivers, and scenery.  The ‘rice bowl’ of Vietnam produces most of its fruit, rice, sugar cane, and coconuts.

The two-hour drive through lush farming terrain ends in Ben Tre, where you’ll take a motorized boat ride through the coconut grove on small channels.  You’ll stop at local cottage industries to watch locals manufacture bricks and weave sleeping mats by hand throughout the boat voyage.  Discover their inherited craft.

Walk through the village alleyways, stopping at local homes for fresh fruits and honey tea, and enjoy a Tai Tu music concert.  Visit another studio where coconut sweets and a variety of coconut husk and fiber goods are created.

Next, take a small sampan through palm-fringed back canals, gliding pleasantly over hidden rivers with a huge diversity of tropical vegetation.  The peaceful rural location is a wonderful break from HCM City’s hectic pace, which seems far away.

Meet locals while riding a motor cart (xe lôi) through hamlets, rice fields, coconut groves, and orchard farms.

Afternoon

You will return to Ben Tre town after lunch and drive through Mekong farmland and communities to Can Tho, stopping at the Vinh Trang Pagoda if time allows.

Evening

Relax this evening.  Explore Can Tho night market and eat local food alone.  The market streets are filled with food stalls selling grilled meats, tofu, and rice-paper banh trang nuong.

Overnight in Can Tho

Meals: Breakfast, lunh

Morning

Rise early for a boat ride to Mekong’s largest floating wholesale market, Cai Rang.  As sellers sell their goods, hundreds of miniature boats race through the market.  Glide around the boats to witness how people exchange fruits and veggies and learn about floating marketing and life on boats.  You’ll then enjoy a local breakfast (rice noodle soup) on the boat.  You can also stop at a local boat to eat seasonal fruit.

After the market, take a boat trip down tiny canals to a traditional rice noodle factory to watch how the locals create rice noodles and taste.

After returning to the city, visit Binh Thuy Old House to meet the current owner and see its magnificent furnishings.  Transfer to the airport for a short flight to central Vietnam’s Da Nang.

Afternoon

You’ll be met by your driver and taken to the hotel near Hoi An Ancient Town for check-in. Hoi An, a 16th-17th-century trading port and UNESCO World Heritage Site, is one of Vietnam’s treasures.  It is today a charming, tiny market town famed for its well-preserved architecture, pedestrianized streets, and world-class food, giving tourists a peek of its rich past.

Overnight in Hoi An

Meals: Breakfast, lunch

Morning

It would be great if we could get a close-up and personal look at the local fishing and cooking groups.  As soon as you are picked up from your hotel in Hoi An, you will begin your journey to the neighborhood market, where you will shop for the ingredients you will need for the day.  In order to prepare for the culinary lesson that will take place later, you need follow the guide and head to the village of Cam Thanh to purchase organic veggies.  On the other hand, before we start this session, let’s go on our boat and go on a river tour. During this trip, we will get the opportunity to interact with local fishermen and have a firsthand experience of traditional net fishing.  As you navigate the canals of the coconut palm paradise, you will also have the opportunity to paddle the one-of-a-kind bamboo basket boat that is traditional to Vietnam.  By taking this tour, you will have the opportunity to gain a cultural perspective on the ways of life of both our farming and fishing communities.

You will then be able to enroll in a cooking lesson, during which you will learn how to prepare dishes such as deep-fried spring rolls, papaya salad with shrimp crackers, pork or fish cooked in a clay pot with steamed rice, and Banh Xeo, which is a rice pancake topped with fresh salad combined with seasonal fruit for dessert.  It is now time for lunch.

Overnight in Hoi An

Meals: Breakfast, lunch

Morning

Enjoy your last day in Hoi An before get the flight to Hue.

Afternoon

The driver will pick you up for the 4-hour journey to Hue via Da Nang.  This trip will take you through My Khe Beach. Drive over the Hai Van (Ocean Clouds) Pass for breathtaking views of the coastline.

Overnight in Hue

Meals: Breakfast

Morning

To pick you up, the guide will come to your hotel and meet you there.  You are going to go on a tour of Hue for one day in order to gain more knowledge about this stunning city.  If you want to see the Thien Mu Pagoda, also known as the Heaven Fairy Lady Pagoda, which is the oldest pagoda in Hue City, you should take a dragon boat to go there.  It will be a wonderful way to begin the journey to take the boat ride to the pagoda in the morning.  When you breathe in the clean air of the Perfume River, you will feel extremely good.  Come and see The Citadel.  Imperial City was previously inhabited by the Nguyen Dynasty, which was Vietnam’s final royal family.  Once you have finished seeing the Citadel, our vehicle will transport you to the Dong Ba market, which is the busiest market in Hue and features a wide variety of cuisines and items.  In this location, you may observe how individuals in the neighborhood buy and sell items.  This is also an opportunity to get presents for your loved ones and close friends.  For lunch, we went to a restaurant in the neighborhood that specialized in Vietnamese and Asian cuisine.

The afternoon

You should go to the Khai Dinh Tomb, which is a combination of Western and Eastern architectural styles.  A brief visit to the Minh Mang Tomb, which is widely regarded as the most stunning of all the Royal Tombs in Vietnam.  Known for its architecture that blends in perfectly with the natural surroundings, it is a popular destination.  You will take the driver straight to the airport to get the flight to Hanoi after you have had a wonderful day.

Overnight in Hue

Meals: Breakfast, lunch

Morning, you have breakfast at your hotel. Driver pick you up from 8:00 – 8:20 am. Begin your day trip from Hanoi with a visit to the Ho Chi Minh mausoleum and and Ho Chi Minh Museum and hear tour guide talk about the man who led Vietnam’s campaign for independence from French colonial rule.  Just next door is Ho Chi Minh’s house on stilts and lying to one side of the Mausoleum is the One Pillar Pagoda, which lies in the campus of the complex. Continue your tour at Van Mieu – Quoc Tu Giam (Temple of Literature), the first Imperial University in Vietnam which was built in 1070. Then visit the Buddhist Tran Quoc Pagoda at West lake, and enjoy the peaceful atmosphere of one of the oldest pagoda in Hanoi.

Have lun lunch local restaurant.   

Afternoon, the trip continues with the Ethnology Museum, a unique museum of peoples in vietnam. Leave the Ethnology Museum, The bus takes you to Hoan Kiem lake. see the peaceful water, and visit Ngoc Son Temple.

And if it wasn’t enough for the second day, we will also attend a spectacular Water Puppet Show, or in the other hand, you can also join a bike tour around the Old Quarter… 36 streets of discovery and excitement!

Stay overnight in Hanoi city

Overnight in Hanoi

Meals: Breakfast, lunch

Morning

Depart for Ninh Binh after picking up from your hotel in the Old Quarter area. Take a brief break for relaxing & restroom at a stopover, perhaps 15 – 20 minutes.

 Arrive at Hoa Lu, the ancient capital of Vietnam in the 10th century, and explore the King’s temples.  Our native guide will lead you to a deeper understanding of the Vietnamese past.

A brief bike ride with a tour guide: Hop on a bike and begin pedaling to see the lovely landscape and limestone mountains along a special path. Should you not want to ride, you are welcome to walk around the village or relax at a nearby café.

Buffet lunch at a nearby restaurant; goat meat meals are the local specialty.

Afternoon

Spend approximately 1h40 to 2 hours exploring the center of natural heritage on a Sampan boat (4 people per boat), rowed by a local.  Discover the incredible subterranean tunnel network and pass through holy temples linked to stories in the past of Trang An. Return to the limousine bus and depart for Mua Cave.  Nearly five hundred stairs will take you to the summit of Lying Dragon Mountain, where you will have a fantastic panoramic view of Tam Coc.

 Drive back to Hanoi from Ninh Binh.

Overnight in Hanoi

Meals: Breakfast, lunch

Morning

Just as the local custom of Tai Chi gently eases you into your day, so does the practice itself.  Take a morning class with a “Local Specialist” aboard a junk boat while taking in the breathtaking scenery.  There are peaceful beaches in Halong Bay perfect for an early morning dip, and if you’re in the mood for some adventure, you can rent kayaks and paddle through the Dark and Bright Caves, taking in the glistening stone walls as you go.

While cruising back to port, you can enjoy a complete breakfast buffet after checking out of the accommodation.  You will return to Hanoi by disembarking at around noon.

Afternoon
Arrive at your hotel in Hanoi where you spend the remainder of the afternoon and evening at your leisure.

Overnight in Hanoi
Meals: Breakfast, lunch

After breakfast, your private car meets you at the hotel and takes you to Hanoi International Airport, where you will board your flight home or continue on to your next adventure; we will assist you with the planning.