''Overall we felt the design of the tour and the itinerary worked really well, and the combination of your expertise and our input on what we like doing resulted in a well balanced itinerary. We’re glad we didn’t attempt to visit north Vietnam as well – we’ll save that for another trip...''
- Mr. Richard Dale and Group (UK) -
Tour: Indochina Sonata 25 Days
Number of people: 04
Nationality: UK
Name list:
Mr. Richard Dale
Mrs. Evelyn Dale
Mr. Mark Barton
Mrs. Helen Barton
1. Guides:
All the guides were helpful and friendly.
In the South: Mr. Trang - very interesting and knowledgeable, especially regarding Vietnam’s history. Always prompt and courteous. The visit to the further away wats and bat temple was not really worth doing – a long drive, and not particularly interesting when we were there. This was not Mr Trang’s fault, more a comment for you when you are doing future itineraries.
In the Centre: Mr. Vinh - Good and interesting, though sometimes he could have given us more information about places we were passing or visiting. He spoke fast English but it was rather difficult to understand. He said his English teacher told him off for missing off the end of words, we told him she was right, you need the end consonant to understand the word.
In Phnom Penh: Mrs. Chan Sophea - a very nice lady, and as she was an age that she had lived through the Pol Pot regime as a child she gave us a fantastic insight into this terrible period of Phnom Penh’s history.
In Siem Reap: Mr. Chea Vanna - he was very helpful, and made good decisions regarding what time of day to visit the various wats to avoid the worst of the crowds. He gave the right amount of info re places – neither too much nor too little.
In Luang Prabang: Ms. Touly - young and charming. She was good and helpful and responsive to the pace we wanted to do things.
In Vientiane: Mr. Chansamone - We had a very quick tour, but he was very good at giving us a quick insight into the things we visited with him.
2. Accommodation:
All the hotels were just right for us – individual hotels, or small chain, interesting design, good rooms, excellent locations, very good friendly service, varied and good breakfasts (we did not eat dinner in many of the hotels so can’t comment on that) We really couldn’t fault them
In Saigon: Grand hotel - Great location, were pleased to be in original building.
In Mui Ne: Victoria Phan Thiet resort - Very relaxing, lovely rooms, super pool areas and gardens, excellent service.
In Hoi An: Life resort - Definitely the best place to stay in Hoi An – excellent location easy walking distance to centre of Hoi An, but also benefited from its own lovely peaceful setting. Our rooms in the junior suites (thank you) were delightful. Breakfasts superb – food and setting. Borrowed bicycles – a good service.
In Hue: Saigon Morin hotel - The rooms on the 5th floor were excellent with lovely views over the bridge and Perfume River. Breakfasts also excellent. Location good, although Hue a slightly strange place., with no real centre.
In Can Tho: Victoria Cantho hotel - We really enjoyed the Victoria hotels. Lovely buildings, terrace restaurant area, bar areas and pool and gardens lovely. River craft are somewhat noisy – at busy times a bit like sitting near roadworks with several pneumatic drills going, but that is not the fault of the hotel. They were doing work to the river bank outside which did cause some noise and visual obstruction.
In Chau Doc: Victoria Chau Doc hotel - glorious situation just raised slightly above the river where you get fantastic views without noise. Small pool area, but worked well.
In Phnom Penh: Sunway hotel - Not as visually attractive as most of the hotels we stayed, but it met our needs really well. The staff were really nice, the restaurant was very good for breakfast and lunch, the bedrooms were very comfortable. The location was good – reasonably easy walk to the centre/river front.
In Siem Reap: Angkor Village hotel - We loved the buildings, the layout and the amazing “pool”. The service was a little disappointing – there were loads of staff but you got the impression that no-one was managing them. Breakfast in particular was a difficult affair – waiter service rather than self service, very slow and not much choice. It let down an otherwise idyllic place. Location worked well – while not in the middle of town plentiful inexpensive tuk tuk’s made it easy to get around.
In Luang Prabang: 3Nagas hotel - We very much liked this hotel, rooms were lovely, breakfast good, we had one dinner in their restaurant, one of the best of the holiday (also the most expensive). Excellent location, central but not noisy.
In Vientiane: Settha Palace hotel - The only slightly disappointing hotel. Whilst it clearly felt it was exclusive and expensive the attitudes were very old fashioned. The bar closed very early. We tried to change money, which they claimed to do, but clearly had no idea of the exchange rate and offered about the same for £s as for $s where you should get twice as much per £ (So we did not change any money there!) Breakfast was good.
3. Transport (Land, water and air):
All arrangements worked promptly and smoothly, minibuses were all air conditioned, some more comfortable than others.
In Vietnam: all very good, no problems, some of the minibuses had rather uncomfortable suspension, OK for short distances but not so good for longer journeys. We particularly enjoyed the speedboat from Chau Doc to Phnom Penh – a good recommendation.
In Cambodia: again mostly very good.
In Laos: all very good.
4. Restaurants:
One of the real highlights of our whole trip was the food. Virtually everywhere we went the food was excellent – super fresh ingredients, excellent vegetables, salads, fruits and fish. All very digestible and never felt ill. It was good that our guides were always prepared to recommend places – some better than others, but that is always the case, and was much better than us just taking pot luck.
In Vietnam: we really enjoyed the complimentary dinner with Trang – a very special restaurant. The other restaurants we ate at, mostly very inexpensive, were nearly all very good.
In Cambodia: it was slightly harder to find nice restaurants here than in Vietnam, but that is probably much to do with the different stage of history that Cambodia is in. Siem Reap had a lot of restaurants, but we suspect many are a bit complacent because they have a never ending supply of tourists.
In Laos: we loved the food in Laos, especially the vegetables.
5. Places you visited:
We enjoyed almost every tour you arranged for us.
6. Design and management of your tour:
Overall we felt the design of the tour and the itinerary worked really well, and the combination of your expertise and our input on what we like doing resulted in a well balanced itinerary. We’re glad we didn’t attempt to visit north Vietnam as well – we’ll save that for another trip. We liked all 3 countries – Vietnam is lively, bustling and full of shopkeepers and mopeds; Cambodia was very interesting but still, not surprisingly, feels as if it is very much still recovering from the shock of the Pol Pot regime and its aftermath – everyone you meet is directly affected. We loved Luang Prabang and will be back in our next trip.
7. Are there any recommendations or criticisms of services, restaurants, shops, visit sites and so on that you’ve visited on your own?
We found it easy to walk/cycle/tuk tuk on our own in various places. Everywhere felt safe and people were friendly and helpful, and mostly spoke enough English to be able to communicate. Restaurant staff in particular were always very keen to practise their English. We enjoyed cycling in and around Hoi An (out to the beach and back) on our own, and would have cycled elsewhere eg Luang Prabang if we’d had more time.
8. It’s highly appreciated if you could send us some of your photos taken during your journey as we’ll need them for our new brochure and updating our website.
I’ll e mail some images separately, or if you prefer I can put some on a disk and post them to you.
Please send us an email if you wish to have the itinerary of Mr. Richard Dale and group for reference. |
