When we had planned for our Vietnam itinerary, a few months back, we had in mind to reach Laos via Vietnam. After our stay in Hanoi, our luxury 2-day cruise in the Lan Ha bay, our Ha Giang loop adventures, we were not exactly looking forward to undergo a 30-hour bus trip to Laos. Especially when this trip is reknown all over the Internet as the “bus ride from hell”. We gave it a long thought, and decided to focus ourselves on Vietnam first. Laos, we will meet another time.

The backbone of our Vietnam itinerary is simple: slowly travelling from North to South, from mid-May to mid-June. Which makes sense, as Vietnam is a long, thin band of land bordered by the East Vietnam Sea. (A nice reminder about how maps are political constructs, as the sea flowing to the shores of China, Vietnam, Cambodia, Malaysia, Indonesia and the Philippines is referred to as the “South China Sea” on most maps). To give you an idea of the country size, you could roughly fit two Vietnams in one France. Don’t quote me on that. 🙂

You followed with delight the first part of our adventures in north Vietnam in the previous article. So let’s go for part 2: central Vietnam!

• First stop: Ninh Binh and its rivers
• Second stop: Phong Nha and its caves
• Third stop: Hue and its imperial city and temples
• Fourth stop: Hoi An and its dolce vita

Ninh Binh and its rivers

Ever felt exhausted on a Monday morning, after an intense weekend of partying / travelling / taking care of your sick kids / bringing the said kids to a thousand activities (choose the options that suit you the most)? That was us, after our all-inclusive trips from Hanoi. When you start travelling for a significant time, you realize very soon that you need to plan rest days. I have to admit, I felt at first somehow guilty, as if I was wasting my previous free time in unproductive activities (I have never spent more time on social media, somehow…). Now, I bless those slow days, when we mostly stay at our homestay and only leave it to eat outside. I read this piece of advice from seasoned travellers mid March – tested and approved since then! It also helps that Dimitri and I always end up at homestays a bit farther away from the most touristical places – not on purpose, we just go with the highest reviews with the lowest prices. It might not be the best for our social life, but it has turned out quite instrumental for our peace of mind. Ugh, look at us – such a “thirty-year-old” speech!

So, in Ninh Binh, we took it slow. The district is famous for its green fields, where you can bike for hours and its rivers, that you explore by traditional boats. Most tourists stay in Tam Coc but we chose at random to stay in Ninh Binh City. I am so happy that we did so: as often, we were the only foreigners in the neighbourhood, with great, cheap restaurants and locals making fun of my height (a true ice breaker topic since the beginning of our trip). Nothing to see in Ninh Binh City, though, so it was about time to rent an automatic motorbike and to go exploring!

Under a crushing heat, we climbed to the Viewpoint Dam Sen Hang mua, from where the green countryside shared the spotlight with the dark grey and green hills, in a stunning color blend like nature masters so well. It made us smile to spot temples at the highest points, distant cousins of the Christian crosses in Europe, always built on the highest summits: humans are all the same, in their fascination with the heights!

The real must seen nearby Ninh Binh can be found a few kilometers away, though: the UNESCO Trang An landscapes. These scenic boat tours take you “past the limestone cliffs, caves and temples of Trang An” (quoting Google maps here). For two hours, a boater pushes you along cliffs, into hundred-meter-long caves, letting you on land to admire the temples hidden along the complex water roads. As the overall protected area amounts to 6,226 ha, I take it that one would need hours to uncover all the secrets of this otherworldly place… We followed the advice found online, booked the latest boat of the day (around 15:30) and ended alone with a French couple at this otherwise very busy site. I can only recommend this tour: this boat ride was one of the many moments during our world trip when we were crushed under the beauty of nature. (At least, I was, as Dimitri and the other guy had been requested to paddle by the boater, who surely would have rather pushed around Vietnamese customers instead of big Europeans.)

Phong Nha and its caves

Another day, another bus trip, another region and city. Located in one of the poorest regions of Vietnam, Phong Nha is a small city located in the Ke Bang National Park (another UNESCO heritage site). When it comes to tourism, you will find one main street, packed with overpriced restaurants catering to foreigners only. And that is it. Don’t expect anything from here, you will get better food for 1/4 of the price anywhere else in Vietnam (you can imagine my face when I got served plain pasta with butter. Voilà. 😭). One simply does not come here for the city itself, but for the spectacular scenary of the dark emerald green mountains and the mystery of their depths.

Feeling adventurous, we started our trip with the local “botanical garden”, a quite serious name for a piece of jungle with paths. “Walking” does not seem like a fair depiction of this hike: we were closer to swimming, in an air so saturated with humidity that it must have been close to 90%. Who wouldn’t dream about being drenched in their sweat after 5 minutes of easy pacing? Our faces must have said it all, because an adorable Vietnamese mum (spotless, contrary to us) offered us bananas, fruits and candies, when we arrived at the top of the waterfall. Thanks to this kind soul, we tasted local candies – I have no idea what I have eaten, and I will not do it again, but heh, worth the experience! 😁

After this idyllic description of Phong Nha, you might wonder why bothering coming here. Forget about all the rest: pay Phong Nha a visit for its mysterious, dramatic caves. As far as I could read, there are several ones but we chose to visit the most spectacular one: the Paradise Cave (Thiên Đường Cave). The cave was discovered by a local man in 2005, and British explorers were the first ones to wander into the 31 km-long stone kingdom. We felt minuscule, meandering into the religious silence of the depths of the earth, looked down upon by stalactites and stagmalites in rooms up to 72m high and 150m wide.

The regular entrance ticket will give you access to the first 2kms of the cave, and special tours could even bring you up to 7kms inside the cave. Following advice from fellow travelers on Google Maps, we went at lunch time and were close to alone in this grandiose limestone paradise.

Day 2 of motorbike rental, and already our wildest ride: picture us on mountain roads large enough for one car, under a pouring rain, with an old motorbike. Quite an adventure, the best driving lesson I could have had!

Hue and its imperial city and temples

Continuing our way down South, we stopped then at Hue, a city with a history of power. The town was the “capital of the Champa Kingdom from 192 to 605”, the “capital of Dang Trong from 1738 to 1775 and of Vietnam during the Nguyen dynasty from 1802 to 1945” (Wikipedia). It was about time to book a guided tour, to learn more about the Imperial City and other major touristic sites!

7:30am: a guide comes to pick us up at our homestay, as planned. No names are asked. We are surprised about the tour being private, as we were expecting a far less customized service. 5min in the taxi already, the guide starts recapping our itinerary of the day: we would travel to the border with Laos, to witness the war memorial. Wait, what?

7:50am: here we are, back at the homestay, after the fastest city tour of all times. It turns out that the guide needed to pick up one lady for another tour, did not even question the fact that the lady happened to be a couple and dragged us instead. I mean, foreigners for foreigners – right?!

8:00am: let’s rewind – time for our actual tour to start! Here comes the visit of “hell”. As the number of sites to visit was completely overestimated, we ended up rushing from one site to another, with 1 hour to get a glimpse of the Imperial City and 30min maximum for all the other sites. Under a unforgiving sun and 40°C. We even had the pleasure to get food poisoning from the restaurant chosen for lunch. Little be said that neither Dimitri nor I recall anything from the places we (hardly) saw.

As every emperor, the Nguyens had a taste for grandiose, as show the many monumental tombs that can be found around Hue. We saw 4 in one day – don’t do that, as you lose interest after the first one.

This exhausting visit could have been avoided, as Hue is a beautiful city, that is better experienced strolling around without purpose. I would advise you to only visit the Imperial city complex and one temple, and then to spend the rest of your time discovering the city and enjoy the impressive culinary culture. Some say that 1,400 of the 2,000+ Vietnamese dishes originated in Hue (likely from a Hue local ;-)). We went to Quán Hanh, a local cantine to try the seafood specialities – a waiter had to intervene to stop us from eating the banana leaf, that was just the package where shrimps were cooked. We got lost in the Phuoc Vinh district, where we asked all the elderly people we met where to find a special restaurant – to end up in a place unknown from Internet, where we paid 68,000 dongs (2.50 euros) for a two-person meal. I high-fived a grandma, who was waving at us. We were asked by middle schoolers what our names were and where we were from (with their best English). We were the challenge of the day for the waitresses of a café, who were pushing one another to come at us, as they were afraid to speak English.

Hoi An and its dolce vita

Let’s continue our road further South, to Hoi An. Contrary to Hue, Hoi An has nothing much to offer culturally speaking, but is famous for its lovely streets, its beaches and its rice fields. We got hit hard by food poisoning from our Hue tour, so the timing could not have been more appropriate. Most city guides advise you to stay in the city center – we did not, and it was for the best.

This was our first time renting bikes in Vietnam. We quickly discovered that we were at the very bottom of the food chain, even below pedestrians, who were more respected on the streets. Now is the moment to admit that I have road rage: I felt like murder towards the motorbikes the entire time. Talk about a peaceful moment! 😁

We quickly flew out of the city center, and reunited with our one true love in Hoi An: the Vietnamese sea. Thanks to the rainy weather, we enjoyed the Cua Dai beach for hours. After three months in Asia, it was our first time at a beach clean enough to bath – what a treat it was! Coming from France, we were a bit prejudiced against sea-front restaurants, which usually take advantage from their location to offer overpriced and blank food. It was all the contrary here, and it’s thanks to the family-owned restaurants. From the teenagers, specialized in catching customers on the beach (10/10 dedication when you saw them running towards you as soon as they spotted you coming their way) to the parents, taking care of your every needs, everything was top notch. I read somewhere that you know that you are at a good Asian restaurant when there are kids doing their homework sat on one table. It’s spotted on! And here we were, savoring our seafood, looking at the sea.

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We could do nothing but fall in love with Vietnam. We are exceptionally lucky to have had the time to cross through the country, one month behind the ideal duration to discover it all. As we are heading now to Cambodia, we hope that you’ll follow us for the last part of our Vietnamese journey, in the South.