Let's start here - Vietnam

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The great travel plan has been a little vague, and intentionally so. We want to have some level of spontaneity on our travels, but flights still need to be booked, and visas still need to be secured.

Earlier this month we booked the flight to our first destination – Vietnam. The country has been on our bucket list for some time, mainly due to rave revues from other travellers. We were ready to click ‘buy now’ on Expedia but hesitated when we realised we knew very little about where we wanted to go and even where in Vietnam we wanted to start.

The easiest way to get a quick overview of the must-see sights was to look at some of the package tours. Although we want to explore the paths less travelled on the trip, we certainly don’t want to miss the iconic sites.

After researching al little, we have decided to start in Hanoi, explore the northern areas including the mountains and lakes, and slowly make our way south over a period of a month to Ho Chi Minh City. After Vietnam, we want to head to Cambodia, Nepal and then India.

Sapa, Vietnam
(Image source: https://pixabay.com/en/sapa-lao-cai-vietnam-1015835/)

We will arrive in Vietnam just in time for Tet, the Vietnamese new year, with 2016 set to be the year of the monkey. This could mean that a normally bustling city is very quiet as families take the time to have a holiday together. We, therefore, wanted to make sure we got there two days before and secured a place to stay.

So for now we have only booked our flight in and first two week’s accommodation through Expedia and will slowly start to plot the rest. It is worth noting that we got a great deal through Expedia when booking our accommodation due to the discounts offered when you have booked your flight. We also used some of our loyalty points to get this deal, but it remains to be seen if our $6 per person room is anything close to the what we saw on the net.

Mekong Delta, Vietnam
(Image source: https://pixabay.com/en/vietnam-mekong-river-mekong-delta-344300/)

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