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Cycling in Vietnam

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Cycling in Vietnam is certainly an experience. Where should you start your journey in Vietnam? There are two ways, from north to south, or the other way around. Some claim the south is not much of interest but I disagree.

Cycling in Vietnam, visiting Champa ruins, here the My Son ruins in the jungle near Hoi An

A general overview of the main things to know about Vietnam, weather, transport, health visa, money etc, you will find here.

Let me give you a quick overview what is possible on the bicycle (you can use the schedule for a public transport journey too.

The journey will start for many travelers in either Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon) or Hanoi). Let's follow the route from south to north.

After staying a few days in Saigon (check our hotels page) you will want to see more of the country. The Mekong Delta is mostly flat, plenty to see, and easy to spend a lot of time wandering from city to city watching the Vietnamese living in and around the mighty Mekong river.

It is also the doorway to Cambodia in Chau Doc. The Mekong Delta is also the most populated area in Vietnam

Near Ho Chi Minh City, Saigon if you want, there are the Cu Chi tunnels and the Cao Dai temple. And further north the hill station Dalat. Dalat with its amazingly mild climate at 1500 meter altitude, its wide green open lands, waterfalls and excellent fruits is a major tourist destination in south Vietnam for both local and foreigners.

Nha Trang is one of the main beach holiday destinations in Vietnam. Further north, around 500 km, you will find Hoi An.

There are two distinct different roads from Nha Trang to Hoi An, one through the Central Highlands and the much easier road along the coast (highway 1)

The beautiful town of Hoi An is a must visit for all travelers in Vietnam. Plenty of excellent accommodation (high and low end) is available)

Several kilometers from Hoi An you will find Cua Dai beach, if you ask me, a much nicer beach then China Beach, further north near Danang. You can continue cycling in Vietnam this way along the coast to/from Danang

Boats on the Perfume river in Hue

The My Son Champa ruins are a great day out in the hills near Hoi An.

Just north of Hoi An lies the industrial city Danang. Although the city is not really worth a visit, it is worth to visit the Danang Cham Museum where many artefacts found in My Son are now displayed. Just south of Da Nang you find China Beach.

Further north in Hue, you will find the Vietnamese Forbidden City, although not a shadow of the glory of the Beijing Forbidden City, still worth a visit. And there are plenty of royal tombs in the area too. There's plenty of cheap hotels too.

One of my favorite photos I made in Vietnam

The DMZ, the Demilitarized Zone which separated North and South Vietnam should be visited by anyone who wants to understand some of Vietnam recent history. It is however an easy and to some extend popular way to travel to Laos. If you have no more time for cycling in Vietnam this is a good way to leave the country. I cycled it in November 2011, it was a good experience.

I would recommend to take the train from Da Nang to Ninh Binh although this is not a lot of extra cycling in Vietnam, see my section about Vinh to Lao Bao.

However, Ninh Binh - Son La - Dien Bien Phu - Sapa - Hanoi. This is minority country and you will find some serious climbs on your way.

Hanoi is of course a must visit and so is Ha Long Bai. It's probably best to leave your bicycle in Hanoi in the hotel where you stay and take the bus to Haiphong. You can cycle to Haiphong but I don't like this very busy road.

As you see, south to north, or north to south, both ways is possible. It's likely you will keep meeting the same people on the way as there is basically one road.

Our cycling in Vietnam pages will talk in detail about the general info, visa, money, language, transport etc. Further we tell you more about certain interesting areas you could and sometimes should visit. We will recommend hotels, talk a little about the Vietnamese cuisine, history and the culture.

The road we will follow goes from Saigon to Hanoi. However, many cyclist and backpackers travel north-south. Nowadays it is easy to extend you visa in either Hanoi or Saigon so there's not a problem to overstay.

Vietnam is an amazingly populated country with 86 million people. It is also a stretched out country, from Saigon to Hanoi about 2000 km but it is quite narrow too, at some points no more then 100km.

The borders to cross are limited. In the south you can cross to Cambodia, central Vietnam is the main Gateway to Laos. In the north since a few years the border at Dien Bien Phu is open to Laos.

Cycling in Vietnam: on the way to Ninh Binh, a view you will
have almost all the way south to Dong Ha in Central Vietnam

Further there are three borders open with China: Lao Cai (near Sapa) leading to Yunnan, Cao Bang and Lang Son (which I used in November 2011), both leading to Nanning in Guangxi province.

How much time you need for cycling in Vietnam? If you want to cycle the whole road above mentioned, take 2 months. However, if you have no problem with using some public transport, you can do it in 3 to 4 weeks depending what you skip. But if you want to see the whole road as mentioned, even traveling by public transport it will take about 6 weeks (my own experience at the time).

An example might be my own recent bicycle ride from Lang Son at the Chinese border at Lao Bao. During this trip I didn't visit the north west (Sapa) or anything south of Dong Ha (north of Hue)

• Ho Chi Minh City, the Cu Chi Tunnels and the Cao Dai Temple
• The Mekong Delta
• Dalat
• Nha Trang Beaches and Champa ruins
• The roads from Nha Trang to Hoi An
• Hoi An and the Cua Dai beach
• My Son ruins, remains of the Champa kingdom
• Da Nang and the road to Hue
• Hue - The Forbidden City and the Tombs and an additional photo page
• DMZ - De-militarized Zone
• Ninh Binh (limestone peaks)
• Ha Long Bay (limestone peak)
• Hanoi
• The North West with Dien Bien Phu and Sapa and Lao Cai
• North Vietnam - Lang Son
• Lang Son to Hanoi
• Hanoi to Vinh
• Vinh to Ha Tinh, a story about luck
• Vinh to the Lao border at Lao Bao

To help you a little with sorting out where is what, we have several maps for you on our Vietnam maps page

Not enough information about Vietnam? We have a special Vietnam Auction for you available with much more about Vietnam

Back to the top of cycling in Vietnam

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