hello my name's Paddy i just completed an epic eight-week trip from the very north
to the very south of Vietnam well almost and i made so many mistakes and i learned so much so
if you're looking for travel advice for Vietnam don't worry i've got you covered because i made
loads of mistakes and i i can't wait to share with you what they were how you can
avoid making the same mistakes i did and get the most out of your trip in vietnam so let's begin
the north is the jewel of not just vietnam but southeast asia honestly the northern mountains
the roads the scenes the towns the viewpoints all of the experiences that you can have in the north
just just out outclass the south if it was me doing this trip again i would start from the south
saigon is a cool big city it's quite westernized you know there's
starbucks and mcdonald's and lots of um designer shops and fast cars and it seems like a cool
entry into vietnam it's not overwhelming like hanoi can be quite overwhelming saigon is the
perfect place to break yourself into vietnam it's a new culture it's a new country and
saigon is the safe place to start this is a big city i could live here as you go further north
you will start with places like dalat and the sand dunes of monet and things will start off quite
well but if you're coming from the north which is so spectacular and so unbelievably beautiful
you'll just be left underwhelmed the more south you go my advice start in the south and head north
by far the biggest mistake i made was travelling vietnam during the school holidays
so without doubt you must avoid the national holidays and the school holidays in vietnam
so vietnam has private public government and international schools and they all have different
months and weeks of the year but overall in my experience anyway june july and august are the
months where the kids are off and when the kids are off the parents are taking them
on their holidays and because of covid and because of the economic situation in vietnam
domestic tourism is the biggest market vietnamese people do travel abroad but not as much as they
travel within their own country so on mass the vietnamese will go to places like da nang munei
natrang dalat you will see coach loads busloads of tourists turning up everywhere that's popular
especially places like sappa as well everywhere i went basically in the month of july and august
i was just a little bit demotivated i was getting to these places early doors seven o'clock in the
morning and the vietnamese wake up early they get on to the buses early they hit these spots and it
was just a bit overrun everywhere i went it was overrun and all of that could have been avoided
if i had waited until september or got a little bit earlier in may because the summer months just
like anywhere in europe when all of the schools in europe go on holiday everyone goes to spain
portugal turkey places like that and the airports are just overrun it's the same in vietnam so avoid
the school holidays and the national holidays there are quite a few national holidays and in the
description of this video i'll put the main ones so that you can look at the dates and try to plan
around those dates because you don't want to be in these towns during the school holidays the third
mistake i made and this is just like a nitpicky thing but i think it's quite funny to include
in this list don't expect cold drinks and don't expect cold beer everywhere you go unlike thailand
taiwan and other southeast asian countries there are no 7-elevens in vietnam well there's a couple
in saigon i saw but that's it there are like other chains of convenience stores but they're not
widespread each town might have one if you're lucky um they're really not on every corner like
you would expect and they're the only places where you're guaranteed to get cold drinks the fridges
are professional level but when you're driving or when you're exploring other parts of vietnam
you will not be able to get a cold bottle of water sometimes and getting a cold beer is almost next
to impossible in the north of the country unless you're staying in a fancy hotel or unless you're
going into a nice restaurant but the amount of times that i ordered a beer and it came as a warm
can of beer or a warm bottle unchilled and now i served it was ridiculous i couldn't believe it
that was the biggest culture shock for me was getting handed warm beer so yeah just expect
to not be having a nice ice cold beer after a big day's adventure everywhere you go in vietnam which
is so sad the next big mistake i made was worrying a lot about the local people and about how they
would be and about the language barrier so the first few days that i started driving out into the
north i had lots of flat tires and i was having lots of issues with my bike and one particular day
i broke down outside this family's guest house and they took care of me they fed me they let
me stay in their guest house obviously they just were amazing so hospitable they even cleaned my
jeans for me because they were covered in mud and that immediately told me that the vietnamese were
not just hospitable and kind but they're also really funny and just good crack the vietnamese
are actually proactive they just get their phone out they open up google translate and they type
in vietnamese and then they press the english translation and they show you what they want
you to understand it might be practical information like oh you can't park here
or are you hungry what do you want the vietnamese are well versed in communicating via google
translate which really helped especially trying to get my bike fixed or solving problems on the
road on a day-to-day basis the language barrier isn't an issue which i thought it would be so
the next few mistakes are really important because they revolve around food and food is so important
to keep your morale and to keep your nutrition levels high when you're in vietnam and the sad
part is the sad part is vietnam is not a foodie destination of course vietnam food is famous
we all know and love fur and ban me and buncha but the reality is when you're on the road when
you're not in the big cities anyway it's really hard to find delicious food so many times so many
days after a day's drive or a day's adventure i would try and rock up to a restaurant and get
something delicious and i would be let down the food would be subpar it was difficult to find
and obviously sometimes they serve at you with a warm beer so i was very demoralized sometimes the
best way to avoid this mistake pack ban me's ban me's are obviously a vietnamese baguette sandwich
packed with deliciousness and you very rarely get a bad bad meat so what i started doing
especially towards the end of the trip was if i found a good coffee place and a good ban me
i would get a ban me and a coffee for breakfast and a ban me to go and if you're going on an
overnight bus or an overnight train or you're going to be on a long day out pack something
delicious maybe your hostel has delicious food get get it to take out get it wrapped up and
bring it with you because there were so many times where i would rock up to a place and it'd be a
big bowl of noodles with lacking flavor lacking oomph and even at dinner time i was struggling
quite often to find good food sadly so it's not a food paradise like in say thailand
um although vietnam is famous for delicious food it was actually quite hard to find decent food
everywhere i went and another mistake i made when it comes to food was i love chili i love
spicy food and i love to enhance the flavor of foods like noodles and rice dishes but in
vietnam so many places would just give you like a red sauce chili sauce on the table you know it
was just processed and it just really lacks flavor and obviously spice and kick so easy thing to do
is just bring with you pack with you your favorite brand of chili sauce maybe it's tabasco maybe it's
some kind of spicy sauce that you can get in the supermarket so if you like chili and spice you're
gonna have to bring it with you this mistake i made quite often and don't make this because it's
gonna cost you a lot of money and this revolves around motorcycles whether you're gonna rent or
buy whether you're going to drive it from top to bottom like i did or you're just going to be
renting it for a day here and a day there please take note that you can't just park a motorcycle
anywhere like you can in places like thailand you can't just rock up park on the pavement
uh pop into a restaurant and eat your lunch you can't just park outside of a hotel or a hostel
um if it's on the street for example you have to ask everybody for permission always can i park
outside don't just assume that it's okay maybe you're gonna park your bike next to 20 other
motorbikes but what you might not know and this is something i didn't know is that these bikes
will have permits they will pay a monthly fee to park on this side of the street or on the pavement
or they might have given money to an old older gentleman who's sitting outside smoking a bong
they will take a small fee and they will take care of your bike and if you just rock up
park the bike and walk off then they are likely to move the bike call the police
get the bike removed or the police which would this happen very often in places like
hanoi and saigon the police will drive around with a truck and they'll just look for bikes that are
parked illegally that don't have the correct paperwork and just pick them up and move them
if you leave your nice helmet on the thing on the handlebar it might go um i went to a cave
and i left my gopro on the handlebar and it was gone it got nicked and motorcycles they are gonna
get nicked people are gonna steal them if you leave the key in um i remember once i parked
dreamy my beloved dreamy i parked it outside of the bus station in chiang mai in thailand and
i went to myanmar for two weeks and when i came back i was trying to find my key and i realized
i'd left my key in the bike and my bike was still there in thailand with the helmet on the handlebar
so in thailand people are less likely to steal things in vietnam you have to be careful um
sadly it's commonplace for things to get nicked and my gopro was stolen and i was very clearly
told that if i didn't move my motorbike several times it was gonna get taken away by the police
so just just bear that in mind you can't just park your bike anywhere be careful a big mistake that
i saw a lot of people make and arguably so did i was trying to conserve my budget too much so
my advice when it comes to budgeting is don't be afraid to splurge especially on these three things
the first is i would go on a luxury cruise in halong bay it was amazing it was well worth it i
paid 300 but i organized it last minute you could probably get it a little bit cheaper and for me
that was a once-in-a-lifetime thing and when are you ever going to be in halong bay so if you are
if you're lucky enough to be there do it right and go on a luxury cruise the second thing i would
splurge on is the high zhang loop the hijuang loop if you are not a motorcyclist if you're too scared
to drive a motorbike by yourself then pay to do the easy rider the hostels and the tour companies
for an extra fee will give you a vietnamese person and they will drive and you can sit on the back
and then you can still go with the group you can still stay in the hostels and have the social
experiences but you'll be sat on the back and you'll see all the views and you'll experience
the loop and it's three days of pure heaven it's three days of pure bliss and for for an
extra 150 dollars spend the money you can save the money somewhere else you know staying in a
cheap hostel for a week um or whatever it might be you can always cut back on savings but
do the hijuang loop don't don't don't miss out on something so incredible just because it was
a hundred or two hundred dollars extra to get an easy ride at all and the third thing is if i was
you when you go to fangnar and the caving you know yes you can go to the dark cave and you can go to
the paradise cave for practically nothing you know just just rental of a motorcycle and the
entrance fee but i would do the multiple day tours that you can do with oxalis you know i would do
um we'll have a look at their website there are three day there are four day tours two day tours
and yes they're 300 400 dollars even us to 3 000 in some cases
splurge when are you going to be in this part of the world where they have the biggest cave systems
in the world and when can you camp in the middle of the jungle surrounded by waterfalls and and
you know swim in the caves for two or three days in a row okay are we ready to get wet
i already went there i'm very excited bunch with really cool like-minded adventurous people so
in vietnam yes it's cheap and yes you can travel on a budget but don't be afraid to splurge money
on these big experiences these big ticket items because they were the ones they were the memories
that i will take away from vietnam you know the highest young luke was just unbelievable
the ha long bay cruise was really special caving in fongnar was just
it was just incredible and everyone i talked to and everybody who sees those photographs
and watches that video is blown away and it really was just incredible but yeah it wasn't cheap so
don't be afraid to splurge your budget there are so many experiences they just can't get anywhere
else and the biggest mistake i made and something that you shouldn't do is don't try to see it all i
really wanted to see it all i know i went all the way up to the north and not just hijuang loop i
went to the northeast i went to the north west i went down through san la down to all these other
northern regions and provinces and then obviously i did all of the central park and then apart from
i didn't go to natrang just because it was a choice i couldn't really do both i had to
either go down the coast to natarang or up through the central highlands to dalat so i had to choose
between the two but otherwise i did everything you know i even went to the mekong delta south of the
of saigon and you know in a two-month trip trying to see everything that's just not enough time
and sometimes you know when you see more you experience less so my advice is see less and
experience more they were my nine biggest mistakes after two weeks two months sorry in vietnam
let me know what you think i probably made a thousand mistakes but these were the nine biggest
the 9 biggest takeaways if you want to say from my trip in vietnam i hope you enjoyed the series
i hope this video was useful if you thought it was slightly useful you'll probably love
my entire vietnam series the playlist is linked below and i'll see you very soon the next video
i will be announcing and showing you and revealing not just where i'm going next but my new motorbike