Vietnam forum

Hi

Myself and my boyfriend are also going in a few weeks around the 14th of July. We are the same, we contacted those you named, as well as Emerude and Vega Travel. All tours are roughly the same (we are going for 3days and 2nights) although I think Tropical Sails is more expensive? We dont want to pay out a fortune as are travelling for 8weeks, but wouldnt like to go on one which is going to rip us off!!

If anyone has any advice on which to book, it would be great!!

P.S will look out for your reply amlifysio to see if it was any good!!

Hi

I am waiting to hear too, as might book when we get to Hanoi as in some other posts people have said this is cheaper, but we shall see.

Although, I just wanted to check with you - we got ridiculous prices from tropical sails quoting around $1000 for their tours both in 3day/2nights and 2day/1night bookings!!

Do you think what they have sent me is right? Did they sent you an email with different tours attached?

Thanks!!

Thanks very much, I will email them and double check, as we simply crossed them off our list as they were so expensive!! They didnt give any pricing in their email simply attached loads of documents at the top!!

Posted from within Vietnam.

We thinhk Heritage Cruise is also a good choice. The packages are not expensive but the services are exellent.

We were recommended this by our hotel, and following a check on Tripadvisor we book it. We are so glad we did. Its not the cheapest tour out there - i think we paid $175 a head for 3days/2 nights on board with kayaking, but it was worth every penny.
We were collected at our hotel and hopped on a decent air-conditioned bus for the trip out to ha long from hanoi, stopping briefly on the way for break. The boat was lovely. The rooms are small, but they are clean, and after 7pm ice cold thanks to the the air con (which you will need). We had a great time on board. You will not go hungry - there is loads of very fresh, very tasty food. the kayaking was nice on the first day, but the second day was amazing. We were literally on our own for kayaking the second day, but it was simply magical.
After dinner in the evenings, the crew break out the old kareoke machine. A lot of people shyed away from but its great fun, and the staff love it when the guests join in. Also we were squid fishing off the back of the boat. you need a bit of patience and luck, but we caught a couple of biggish ones between us.
A special thank-you to our guide Bang. He was very funny, and very informative and even cooked us lunch on the mini boat after our kayaking. It was my first time trying crab and it was delish!
Another must do is swimming at sunset off the boat. Amazing.
Easily the highlight of our trip so far!

Posted from within Vietnam.

Back again... We returned from our trip with the Calypso Cruiser (Oriental Sails) 4 days ago.And we were very satisfied! Being 5 persons in our group (3 daughters, my husband and I) we had cabins with connecting doors in the front of the boat. Worked out very well. The staff and especially our guide, Trang, were lovely. The boat was quite new - from late 2009 - and everything was shining. The food was wonderful, but I guess that goes for all the boats in this price segment. We payed 560 USD through hotels-in-vietnam.com. But our guide said that if you book through her, you can get a better price. I don't know if that is true. But here is her e-mail in case you want to try: Trang.guide@gmail.com Her full name is Doan Thu Trang. Just to tell how helpful and truly wonderful she was I will tell you what happened to us: On the bus returning to Hanoi my daughter forgot her quite expensive digital camera. We didn't find out until 1 hour before our train for Hue was leaving. Not knowing what to do we called Trang. She called the driver, and they had found the camera. She showed up at the railway station and told us that they couldn't get us the camera in time before the train left, but she would arrange to have it sent after us. She gave us an address in Hue where we could pick it up 2 days after. And the camera did turn up!!! We didn't have to pay anything and she refused any kind of payment. Luckily we had already tipped her before leaving the boat. You should be happy if you get her as your guide. Only complaint about the Calypso Cruiser is that the drinking water is way too expensive. Given the heat we experienced (about 37 C)I think 1 USD for a small bottle of water is almost robbery. I don't mind paying for beer and soft drinks, wine etc but water is a basic need. And they told us we couldn't bring our own. But perhaps you should smuggle water with you?? More questions? I will be happy to answer them.

Posted from within Vietnam.

Hello noakess,
We had a 2 days/1 night package which we thought was quite enough. We slept on the boat and included was the kayaking - about 1 hour,a guided trip to the Amazing Cave, a short cooking class (half an hour - springrolls) in the evening, fishing squid from the boat at night after dinner (we didn't catch any, but good fun for the kids) all the food etc. as mentioned in the itenary.

At night we anchored next to the other boat from Oriental Sails, but apart from that I didn't see others. A beautiful fullmoon was included in our package, but of course I can't guarantee that

The kayaking was not crowded but there is a LOT of other boats out there and i think that you should be very lucky if you don't meet other people or boats out there. But nevertheless it is still worth going - even if you are not completely on your own.

Hi,
I am new to this website and would liketo ask noakes a question about his junk trip. I am not sure if you can send private messages over here.

Noakes,
Have you booked your junk trip with Doan Thu Trang? Would you recommend her service? How was Calypso - did it meet your expectations?

Thanks!