hey guys welcome to my channel if you're
new i'm skye and for the past two months
my boyfriend and i have been traveling
around vietnam so in today's video what
i want to tell you are the pros and cons
about traveling to vietnam in 2022 so if
you're thinking about visiting soon you
should probably watch this video until
the end because i'm going to tell you
the pros and the cons and also some
things that i just think are worth
knowing before you visit the country so
let's dive right in i'm going to start
with the pros because no good video ever
starts on a bad note so let's start on
pro number one vietnam is officially
open for everyone which is a huge pro
especially in my case there's no pcr
tests no vaccine no quarantine it's
completely open so it's a great country
to choose in southeast asia right now
the second pro has got to be
the cost of living it is so cheap it's
crazy to give you an idea for local food
you can get like a buncha which is a
simple vietnamese dish and it cost less
than one pound fifty obviously like
anyway if you eat local then you're
gonna spend less if you wanna go more
western then you're gonna spend more and
a good thing about vietnam especially in
the capital hanoi is that they offer so
so so much western food it's crazy we
always rent apartments on a monthly
basis and we got an apartment in hanoi
for approximately 650 pounds this was
for the whole month bills included wi-fi
you can't complain with that can you
somehow i don't know how we still rented
apartments for a month we still ate out
three times a day we still had gym
memberships yoga memberships haircuts
going out at the weekends but somehow we
managed to spend less in vietnam than we
did in thailand so that just proves that
it is cheaper the next pro has got to be
how convenient it is in vietnam so
transportation in vietnam is spectacular
like most people when they come to
vietnam they either start south and go
to north or north and go to south one or
the other but it's really really easy to
move around in vietnam so if you're not
taking a flight
and you'd rather save some money you can
do sleeper buses they have so so many
sleeper buses in vietnam that travel
from
each destination so it's very very easy
to get around another thing that i love
about this country is that the grab
service is on point if you don't know
what grub is it's basically like an uber
for those of you who live in the uk i
think uber might be in the us i don't
know but it's basically a taxi service
and also food delivery service in
vietnam so basically if you can't bother
to leave your house but you want to eat
some food grab
20 minutes
at your door next pro has to be
how beautiful
picturesque
amazing the country is
so in my opinion the most picturesque
and beautiful places that i have been
personally was hoi an
for sure it had kind of like a french
vibe it was very very beautiful a nice
river lots of good spots to take photos
highly highly recommend and another
place which i cannot stop going on about
oh my god is that cajun is the hajjang
loop so in the north a couple of other
popular places to go for nature and
beauty are sappa
ninbin and ha long bang you can imagine
just rice fields
mountains
beautiful roads it is honestly just
unbelievable next is something which i
think is super important to mention is
that foreigners are very welcome and i
never felt unsafe in vietnam
if i'm honest comparing vietnam to
thailand it did feel a little
less safe just in terms of
a couple of things that did happen
whilst i was there which i'll get onto
later on but i never felt unsafe so
less safe than thailand but i never felt
unsafe i still would feel happy to go
out on my own and go exploring on my own
i never felt like i was ever in danger
so if you're a solo traveler looking to
get to vietnam i would definitely
recommend it i would say not to be too
worried about safety but keep your wits
about you for sure the next thing and
something which is very very important
to me because i'm an absolute foodie is
the food and coffee culture so if you
didn't know vietnam is like one of is it
like second or third one of the top
exporters for coffee or manufacturers
for coffee one or the other and that is
for very good reason because if you go
to vietnam and you try the coffee you'll
understand
i
thoroughly thoroughly enjoyed both the
coffee and food in vietnam the local
vietnamese food is really really
delicious a couple of dishes which i
would recommend to you to try the
vietnamese is 100 buncha
and beef [ __ ] they're both very basic
meals but very delicious simple but
delicious
another thing that i would recommend you
to try is the pancakes the rice pancakes
oh my god so obsessed and another
amazing thing about vietnamese food is
that it's so so
fresh in every restaurant that i visited
in hanoi
every dish always came with fresh herbs
and vegetables
it's just amazing i loved it if you're
in hanoi or ho chi minh city i would
highly highly recommend you to do a food
tour
dive straight in try all the vietnamese
food you will not be disappointed okay
and the last thing is that vietnam is
actually a really good country for
expats most foreigners that i met that
lived in vietnam were teachers so they
were teaching in schools in vietnam but
also people do like myself work online
and there are a few places which in
vietnam are popular for expats and they
are hanoi
hoyan and
so if you're looking for somewhere to
relocate reset up your life and you want
to be in a cool beautiful country a very
cheap one then they are the places for
you to check out they're my personal
favorite was definitely hanoi and if you
want more of an expat vibe in hanoi
definitely check out the area of tahoe
it was really good
okay
next we're going to talk about the cons
though i don't ever like to talk about
the bad side of traveling let's just
keep it real there's not many people on
youtube especially or instagram that
like to keep it real when it comes to
traveling for the most part
with myself included we like to share
you know the highlights the good side
everything's beautiful but the truth is
with good comes the bad and it's really
important to also share
the bad sides especially when it comes
to traveling now for any vietnamese
people who are watching this whatever i
say is a con
please do not take this personally i am
just giving you
my personal experience so please please
please don't take offense for the first
con about traveling to vietnam in 2022
is the visa situation
so a few years ago if you were a
foreigner enter in vietnam you used to
be able to get three month visas not
having to worry about visas is like an
absolute holy grail honestly there's
just so much stress so the three month
visas was an absolute bonus but now
unfortunately the visa situation only
allows foreigners to enter vietnam for
30 days at a time what we did was we
applied for an e-visa before we left and
this enabled us 30 days in the country
however
if we had arrived with no visa and just
got a visa on arrival then we would have
only had 15 days in vietnam depending on
which country you're coming from will
depend on how long you get in the
country whether you get an e-visa or not
so definitely look up the rules on that
online before you enter vietnam but
there are rumors that things are going
to change soon and that these old
three-month visas are coming back so
pray for that otherwise
that's all you're gonna get in vietnam
and you have to do a border run we had
to do a border run and stay there for
two months and the border run was just a
long day and it's kind of the reason why
we're going to leave vietnam um because
we don't want to keep having to do
border runs every month it's just a
complete pain in the ass if i'm honest
the next con and
though it's not really a con it's kind
of something just to
be aware of especially if you come into
vietnam with kids is that in the summer
months it
is
hot
oh my god i we came from thailand which
was very hot
we went to vietnam it was
next level hot it just took a lot of
time for us to get used to the the heat
and the humidity it was just next level
so be aware that the summer months are
really really hot or just don't visit
during the summer months another con
would be the limited english so for the
most part the younger generation in
vietnam did speak a lot of good english
that we were able to communicate with
them very very easily but the older
generation in vietnam didn't speak that
much english and
yeah this is kind of a con but also like
i don't expect them to speak english i
mean we're very very privileged that you
know majority of the world do speak it
it's definitely something just worth
noting because
a lot of the time you either have to
point which is fine
or you'll you'll find yourself using
google translate a lot i just wanted to
mention that because for some people
that barrier communication barrier is
really frustrating for me not so much
but um
yeah i can see people would find it
frustrating the next con is traffic oh
my god
when you arrive in vietnam there's a
high chance that you'll either go first
to ho chi minh city also known as saigon
or hanoi and i just gotta tell you it
was just the next level
it was really really busy really really
crazy for some people they love this but
for me it just
was a bit of a
that's what you get when you go to the
city not the whole of vietnam is like
that obviously but just be aware that if
you are going to the cities expect some
traffic and the last one i want to
mention because as you've seen in my
other videos if you've watched them in
vietnam then you will know that this has
happened to me i do want to mention it
briefly and that is a couple of scams so
we've been traveling for two years and
we've never actually been scammed well
at least we don't think we have maybe we
have we just found ourselves being
scammed pretty frequently at the
beginning point of our trip now i'm not
bashing vietnam saying that oh my god
don't go there because they scam you
that is not what i'm saying at all but i
want to share with you that
these things can happen the people that
we met for the most of our time in
vietnam were absolutely
amazing people but like i said i did
just want to mention it
so that you don't lose a lot of money or
buy a fake ticket or something like that
just keep yourself safe and that's it
for the cons but there's just a couple
of other things that i think are worth
noting before you travel to vietnam
personally in my opinion if you like
cities like a city life i would
definitely recommend going to hanoi
if you like nature just basically head
north in vietnam in my opinion i think
the north was 10 times better than the
south something that i want to mention
for expats and digital nomads looking to
work in vietnam is that the wi-fi was
always good we never had bad wi-fi we
never experienced like blackouts and the
last thing i want to say and something
which i keep raving about because it was
genuinely one of the best things i've
ever done
is the hajjang loop if you are not
confident riding a bike like i wasn't
but you want to see the most insane
nature have the best four days exploring
an adventure then i would highly highly
recommend you to do the hajjang loop
honestly it was incredible if you
haven't seen my videos but it sounds
like something that you would love to do
then go watch them and see what you
think because i genuinely think there's
no better option for you in vietnam
and that's basically everything that i
wanted to say to you today if you have
any questions or want to know anything
else please drop me a comment down below
and i'll be more than happy to answer
them
in the meantime i do want to say thank
you so so much to everyone from vietnam
who's been supporting me supporting the
channel and everyone else also
thank you so much vietnam has been an
absolute
amazing time two months is definitely
not long enough for us
maybe we'll be back in the future who
knows it's been a pleasure thank you so
much thanks for watching like subscribe
do all that good stuff and i will see
you
in the next country
which is
malaysia
see you there