Travel Vietnam on Motorbike

A motorcycle tour (ACTIVETRAVEL ASIA)  is one of the best ways to see Vietnam and understand the local people. Many travelers talk of it as being the adventure of a lifetime and I agree… After all, I live the adventure.

Travel Vietnam on Motorbike

There are thousands of local and hundreds of offices offering similar motorcycle trips and services in Vietnam, Many of them very good. Most of them travel the same routes and visit the same places….. all worth seeing. Why travel with us? We will also take you to many of the same places, but you will find our services different than the rest.

I am a resident foreigner that understands what you want in an off the beaten track adventure. Some might argue that as a foreigner, I cannot offer a good tour…. They are mistaken. It is because I am a foreigner that understands the language, culture, and geography of Vietnam, or maybe more importantly, I understand what a foreigner wants that makes our tours exceptional. Perhaps that is why so many easy riders wish to join my team.  At the current time, I am still leading tours and training new team leaders.

Travel Vietnam on Motorbike

All of our team leaders have a better understanding of how a foreigner thinks in order to give them the best holiday possible. We do not just randomly assign easy riders to you. We will assess your group and destination and assign the riders whose personality and experience fits with where you want to go and how you like to spend your time. If not otherwise booked, I may be leading your group. Because of Laws and Liabilities in Vietnam, we do not travel with guests wishing to drive their own motorcycle. Each individual will have their personal guide and driver. I can understand the desire, but it is just not safe. You must also be aware that you will be driving illegally and be non insured. Besides, how can you enjoy the countryside when watching for pot holes and crazy drivers, not to mention livestock, stinging insects, and incredibly aggressive commercial vehicles? Leave that concern to us. So again….. Why travel with us? Following is what makes us unique

Travel Vietnam on Motorbike

Our tours are heavy into interaction with the locals and not just drive, stop, and take photo.All of our riders have larger, comfortable motorcycles and are able to handle large travel packs.We offer the security of you being able to research and trust the people you are booking with. All leaders are accountable, reliable and will give you a full day’s value. At the end of the day we will stay with you dining or socializing or offer you to join us for local evening entertainment with local friends until you are finished with us.

Travel Vietnam on Motorbike

Unlike many who claim to go on untraveled roads…. We actually do and often you will be one of the very few who have been some locations.We only use good and clean accommodation. We do not use local places that are better financially for the riders than the customer. A good night’s sleep makes the next day so much better.

Tours are custom built for every group and we assign riders most knowledgeable for your destination. Whether is it photo shoots, research into ethnic minorities, war history, or the ecology.I personally follow up all tours to assure quality. Our exemplary reputation is very important to us and we wish to keep it that way.

Our package prices are very competitive and often work out less because what you see is what you get! There are no hidden expenses, no surprises and no schemes to get at your dollar. We provide everything. All you need pay for is daily dinner, and your drinks, (even that can be included if you wish) and have a worry and stress free holiday.

ACTIVETRAVEL ASIA would like recommend Motorcycling Northwestern Trails tour.Discover Vietnam’s rugged and scenic northwest and its people first hand. By taking to the roads and riding from the capital Hanoi to the remote area of the northwest we can see life as it truly is for the Vietnamese. The perfect itinerary and the support crew ensure you get the most out of the trip in terms of comfort, enjoyment and adventure. Along the way we encounter dramatic landscapes and sweeping panoramas as the rural population goes about its business. Highlights include the terraced valleys of Sapa, challenging roads, stunning scenery and many different colorful minority groups.

Some essential tips in Motorbike tour

1. Reasons for choosing motorbike

Motorbike is considered the best means of transportation for traveling mountainous areas due to its convenience and initiative. With a motorbike, one is free to go wherever he loves, despite all kinds of road’s condition. He can stop whenever he feels like to take photographs or relaxing, instead of depending on the driver or tour guide. Motorbike helps integrating people with nature and fresh air, and one will never be afraid of motion sickness. If choosing a car, people are likely to waste hours sleeping in passenger’s seat with air condition, not to mention the car sick caused by consecutive slopes and mountain passes. Riding on the motorbike means living on every single kilometer of your itinerary! Moreover, one can ride a motorbike in any kind of terrains, and it is much easier to repair in case of breaking down.

  

                                        

        

From the Back Seat: Memories on a Motorcycle in Vietnam

Riding a motorbike from the North to the South of Vietnam was an amazing experience. Now, while I didn’t ride the motorcycle on myself (Anthony did an amazing job!) it is still something that will remain with me for the rest of my life.

Each day we were faced with new challenges and amazing sights making the journey all the more incredible. I think what made it so momentous was the simple fact that we were in control of where we wanted to go on the trip. It didn’t have to be governed by train and bus timetables (how we normally get from A to B). We were able to stop anywhere we wanted to and take our time to stop and smell the rice paddies!

It was hard to pinpoint my favorite memories, but for anyone thinking of doing a trip similar to this, I hope this post inspires you! It was an amazing journey and loved every minute of it!

Rice Paddies

Rice fields in Vietnam

I had always wanted to see the bright green rice paddies that I seen in so many photos and our time in Vietnam I defiantly got what I asked for! We would ride for hours and hours through countless rice paddy fields, each one greener than the last. The fluorescent color of the neat fields would be on either side of us. We stopped often just to stare at the endless plains of the newly growing rice.

Road Butterflies

When we were riding on the Ho Chi Minh Road, there would be stretches of the trail where hundreds of butterflies would flutter up from the road and surrounding trees and shrubs. We would sometimes find ourselves riding through almost hundreds of them-I felt like I was in the forests of Narnia! Anthony said they were just moths but I still protest that they were beautiful butterflies just fluttering by!

Iced Tea

A common drink in Vietnam is Iced Tea or Tra Da, and it quickly became our favorite drink to rehydrate with whilst on the road. Rather than being a sweet tea it is usually just green tea or another kind of herbal tea with ice added. So thirst quenching and refreshing!

We would stop at little roadside cafes regularly to grab one of these cheap and satisfying drinks. Many a time the owners would continually top up our glasses with a big grin. They seemed to be so proud to serve us.

At one town, Kham Duc we stopped in and got ourselves tea from a family. Minutes later the wife brought out some freshly baked teacake for us to eat with cream-scrumptious! We had about three glasses of tea each and chatted to the family in broken English.

When we were ready to leave and went to pay they would not take our money. No matter how much we plead with them, they would not take our cash. This was true Vietnamese hospitality that we had experienced and were so grateful for.

Motorcycling in Ho Chi Minh trails, Vietnam

Getting Dirty

One day we were taking our motorbike through the countryside around Hue so we could independently visit some tombs and mountains. Since I was in charge of the map it was my job to get us to where we wanted to go. Bumping along a dirt road I soon realized we were going the wrong way and the actual track was on the opposite side of rice fields. We sloshed our way slowly through. We weren’t hurt-just dirty, but that didn’t stop us from continuing the day to see the tombs!

Being on the open road in Vietnam was unbelievable. Noisy at times, busy most of the time but such a great trip. We did over 3500km in the two months we were there. I love thinking that in years to come I can look back on my trip with Anthony on our trusty ‘Bullet’ and have great stories to tell the Grandkids!

Find our more Vietnam motorcycling videos here

Source: positiveworldtravel

Motorbiking Ho Chi Minh Trail, Vietnam - an unforgettable travel adventure

The 125-cubic-centimetre engine of the scooter was screaming for forgiveness, throwing off so much heat it burned through my jeans, singeing my leg hair.

All morning I'd been mercilessly holding the throttle wide open, climbing hills so steep it seemed like the bike might die any minute under the weight of my wife and me. We maneuvered around potholes the size of bomb craters at full speed (which was about 80 kilometers an hour, downhill, with no wind), just trying to keep a faint trace of our guide's rear tire in sight as he pulled ahead effortlessly on his 250-cc Suzuki dirt bike.

Children on their way to school, Vietnam's Ho Chi Minh Trail.

We finally caught up to our guide, Quang, on the other side of a long tunnel at the top of a mountain pass. He pulled over for a bathroom break in the thick growth that borders the road, explaining to us that, at that moment, on that deserted mountainside road, we were neither in Vietnam nor neighboring Laos but in between them both.

Two signs confirmed this -the one behind us that read Vietnam and the one 100 meters in front of us that read Laos. The fact that it was completely unguarded speaks to its isolation. Well, that and because no matter how far I looked out into the horizon, I saw nothing but green jungle and blue sky.

I tried to remember the last car we saw on the road, which would have been just outside of Da Nang, right before we pulled off the highway and on to five hours of back roads.

Riding a motorcycle on the storied Ho Chi Minh Trail was something I said I would do given the chance -if not for the sense of adventure at least to say I did it -but until we met Quang I never gave it much more thought.

But after traveling for half a day on endless mud roads through remote villages on a scooter that was clearly not meant for it and then hearing our trusted guide, a former soldier during the Vietnam War, tell us how easy it would be to make us disappear, I was beginning to wonder if we made the best choice.

If time isn't an issue, it's possible to ride the Ho Chi Minh Trail all the way from Saigon in the deep south to Hanoi in the far north (this very trail, after all, was how the North Vietnamese army covertly shipped its supplies to the south during the Vietnam War). But since time was an issue for my wife and me, we decided to take the abbreviated tour from Da Nang to Hue.

To take the scenic route, however, through villages of thatch-roofed huts, past the most vibrant green rice fields you can imagine, around the infamous Hamburger Hill, up the Ho Chi Minh Trail and then back down a winding mountain road into Hue's city centre, takes three days.

Stunning view on Ho Chi Mịnh Trail,Vietnam

A benefit to having a guide is that he or she can act as a default translator. While it's not uncommon to hear English spoken in large touristy cities, in the mountains it's an entirely different experience. Menus will only be in Vietnamese, and they won't come with pictures like they do in Ho Chi Minh City. Since my Vietnamese is limited to ordering iced coffee, this proved invaluable and I was happy to partake in the many roadside coffee stops that Quang insisted on.

Well, I did go up in the mountains for an adventure (as well as a photo beside the Ho Chi Minh Trail sign). If you can call riding down a steep mountain incline, 1,000 meters above sea level in the middle of the jungle, pulling over every few minutes to dry heave while you swat flies the size of M&Ms off the back of your neck adventurous, then I guess I accomplished my mission.

Source: canada.com

ACTIVETRAVEL ASIA hosted Australian Motorcycle Travel group in Vietnam in Oct 2010

ACTIVETRAVEL ASIA (ATA) have hosted a group of Australian Motorcyclists to take the motorcycle trip in Ho Chi Minh Trail, Vietnam. This trip started from Hanoi and finish in Hoi An, Quang Nam province in Oct 20, 2010.




With 7-day motorcycling tour in Ho Chi Minh trail in total 11 day trip from Hanoi to Hoi An, Quang Nam province, this motorcycling grading of tour is considered as Moderate to challenging by ATA.

The legendary Ho Chi Minh Trail was the supply line used by North Vietnam to link North and South Vietnam during the American War. Soldiers, ammunition, weapons and supplies were carried by hand, bicycle and truck for hundreds of kilometers through the otherwise impenetrable jungle that covered Vietnam’s mountainous border with Laos. A testimony to the ingenuity, fortitude and commitment of the northern Vietnamese, the trail slipped from use at the end of the war and was taken back by the jungle.

Recent road work that follows original sections of the trail has changed this. Besides incredible driving, deep in the Vietnamese countryside; this ride takes in the charming ancient trading town of Hoi An, Khe Sanh battle site and DMZ. Travelers also take time to stay overnight in a traditional Thai hill tribe and visit to some tribal villages on the way.

Australian motorcyclists is group of the 8 motorcyclists and love motorcycling trail especially on the historical trail during Vietnam War in the past by motorcycling.

Travel Tips
- Motorcycle travel tips: Vietnam motorcycle travel tips
- Motorcyle guide & trail:Ho Chi Minh trail & travel guide
- Motorcycle tours: Motorcycle tours in Vietnam