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Anne-Marie Ivarsson/Matz NilssonCon Dao Island - Flight ticket & Hote booking service
Dear Ms Luu Vo! Now we are back in Sweden since last Monday and here is cold and windy and only 2 degrees, but no snow. We want to thank you for a fantastic journey in your country and in Cambodia. You and your office have done a very good work. Everything was perfect and the three guides we had both in Vietnam, Phnom Pen and Siam Reap were very professional and pleasent. Vi felt very safe the whole time. Please if you can tell them that. We must not forget the chauffeurs who drive us safety. We hope of course that we can come back to Vietnam some time. We liked Ho Chi Minh very much. Some feedback will we give, the hotels have been good, besides the hotel in Siam Reap, where the staff were not so serviceminded. The Con Dao islands will probably be good in a future, when they have cleaned up the beaches and the fishingboats were gone, but the resort and the staff were very nice. We wish you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. Best regards from me and my friends Anne-Marie Ivarsson
Kurt Ulrich2 weeks Mekong delta tour and Phu Quoc island
Dear TNK Team, dear Luu vo
I visit in the last 2 years alone or with group tours many times Vietnam. Last trip in 2007 I fund for the Mekong delta tour a tour operator in Phnom Penh and partner office in Chau Doc, Vietnam. This tour was very cheap but!!! also very simple in service, accommodations, food and organization! This year in February I had a group of 10 Swiss guests and I was happy to here from TNK travel agency in Saigon. The secretary Luu vo was a great organizer and she send me quickly a package of a tour around the Mekong Delta during 2 weeks. We had our private guide Mr. Ky, a friendly Vietnamese. He had doing for us the best job and he show us beautiful famous places away from the big tourist groups. Two destinations was not so good standard and could be better for next time! We would enjoy in Can Tho one night in homestay leaving but the bungalows was not only very old, there was not clean and during the night we had no water! A similar situation we fund on the island Phu Quoc in the Tropical Resort. One of the nicest place so close to the beach under a lot of palm trees, but the quality of the bungalows was less then medium.
Anyway all of my guests enjoy this Vietnam trip and we can recommend TNK one of the best tour operator in Vietnam.
Thanks so much. Kutschi
Daniela MeiromMeirom group -Vietnam trip
Hello
We are home now and I expected some kind of a feedback request from you but so far got nothing, and decided to send one anyway.
First of all I wanted to thank you in the name of the whole group for a very successful trip. Everything went smoothly and according to plan. The itinerary was well planned, the guides were knowledgeable and caring, the vans were in good condition and comfortable.
I would like to point out several things that were less than 100% - maybe it will be useful to you in the future:
a- the english accent of some of the guides was very bad and we could hardly understand them. Our best guide was Dara in Phnom Penh, unfortunately he was with us only for one day. Chum in Hanoi and Ky in HCM city were also good, The others were also good and warm and kind and we loved them all, but sometimes we had hard time to understand them, maybe because we are not native english speakers
b- most of the hotels were good. The worst was in Phnom Penh - small and smelly rooms and awful maitenance. The one in Siem Reap had nice rooms, but lots of maitenance problems. The same goes for the hotel in Sapa - they had serious problems with the hot water supply, which was extremely annoying.
c- the itinerary was almost perfect, but I think the time in Siem Reap was too long, 2 days would be quite enough, and it could be nice to spend one more day in Hoi An or Hue.
Thank you for everything. We had a very good and interesting experience and will certainly recommend your company to our friends Daniela Meirom
Julia PriceTrip
Hi Would just like to thank you for the great service provided by TNK. We have just returned from a 2 week trip and booked accomodation in three areas through yourselves. In a trip where any thing that could go wrong did, it was great to arrive somwhere and know that at least our hotel booking was hassle free. Thanks heaps for the great service. Regrads Julia
The Kane familyA wonderful experience with TNK travel (January 2009)
Our family of 4 just came back from first ever trip to Vietnam (18 days). We chose TNK Travel and it was a great trip. I wanted to thank TNK and to share our experience with future prospective travelers.
We started the planning almost a year ago. I must say we were hesitant at first and concerned about choosing a reliable travel agency. I read a lot on the internet (e.g. tripadvisor .com) before identifying a few prospective travel agencies. I then asked for an initial quote from my top 3 choices. TNK was the middle quote but what I liked about them was the level of detail in their initial proposal. I then looked at their guestbook and selected 17 people worldwide who recently travelled with them and emailed each of them to ask about their experience. Every single one of them responded and all were very positive about TNK. This made me comfortable with the idea of having to send money upfront to book a trip in an unknown country where I would have no recourse if dealing with an unethical company. With TNK, everyone assured me that once an itinerary is finalized, the company will do whatever is needed to deliver on its promises and to make it a pleasant experience, and they sure did in our case.
Over the following month, I exchanged several emails with Mr. Dsung Trinh, the Managing Director, to modify the original proposal based on my research about the sites we wanted to see. For example, we removed Sapa from the itinerary because the Northwest is quite cold in January, but added Phu Quoc Island instead. In the end, we agreed on a price for the revised itinerary, and I paid the customary 30% deposit by credit card (with a 3% fee). From that point-on, I dealt with Mr. Dac Dahn in their operations department who always promptly answered my numerous enquiries via email, and sent me hotel vouchers and e-tickets confirmation from air travel within Vietnam, as well as the invitation letter for the Visa. Fast forwarding to the end of the year when our trip began:
We landed roughly on schedule in Hochiminh on Dec. 31st in the evening and had to wait an hour or so (not ideal after a long flight from the U.S.) to get our visa on arrival ($25 per person in cash). Once we exited immigration and customs, our guide (J.J.) and driver were there to greet us with a sign bearing our name. They took us to our hotel. Because of the traffic, we ended up being in the center of the city near the cathedral at midnight, surrounded by thousands of motorcycles ringing their horns when the near year arrived (quite a cultural experience). From there on, the entire trip was very pleasant (I will post details on the hotels on tripadvisor.com). We visited Saigon (and stopped by the TNK office to pay the balance of the trip), the Mekong Delta, Phu Quoc, PanThiet/Mui Ne, Da Lat and Nha Trang by private van and boats with J.J. (who was excellent, paying attention all the time to what we liked and making sure we would always have it). We almost missed the speedboat from Rach Gia to Phu Quoc, because the itinerary was 30 minutes off. As a result, we couldn’t have a scheduled lunch, but TNK compensated us with an excellent previously unplanned dinner in Hue. J.J. ordered a van with more legroom when we returned from Phu Quoc to HCMC (we flew back), arranged for a small canoe to pick-us up and take us to our hotel in Cantho where we were stuck in traffic on the way to the ferry, etc…Then we flew to Danang and were greeted by our new guide Tui (Mr. Dac Dahn had kindly arranged for French speaking guides at the other locations at our request), and from there visited Hoi An, My Son and Hue, Tui was excellent as well, very knowledgeable and helped us solve an issue we had with a tailor-made suit. In Hoi An, the reservation was not a river view room, but after contacting Mr. Dac Dahn generously agreed to pay the difference and we were upgraded accordingly (we had insisted on 2 deluxe rooms with sea/river/lake views everywhere) and I had not noticed it was not the case at that location. We then flew to Hanoi which we visited with our last guide (Mr. Lan, who was OK but not as good as the first 2), and went from there to Halong Bay for a memorable 2-day cruise, then flew back to HCMC, stayed overnight near the airport and had an early morning flight back to the U.S. On returning to HCMC, no driver was there to greet us, we were told after we called the agency that he was stuck in traffic due to an accident. We took a taxi to the nearby hotel, and the driver who picked-us up in the morning for our return flight to the US. reimbursed us more than we had actually paid for the taxi. We didn’t have to pay a departure tax, it was apparently already included in our plane tickets.
Overall, a great trip thanks to the logistics, efficiency and professionalism of the TNK staff and agents. Food was excellent (though too copious for us, we always have festive lunch menus booked by TNK with 6 or 7 courses in nice restaurants (included in the price), nice buffet breakfasts in most hotels. The only problem (which is beyond TNK’s control) was insufficient hot water in many hotels for two people to take showers one after the other), a really bad road with big holes when exiting MuiNe to go to Da Lat and a third guide in the north who took us to a number of expensive stores along the road when we saw much cheaper prices elsewhere (we suspect he had a kick-back from these stores (but to his credit, he advised us to see the anthropology museum in Hanoi instead of a couple of extra pagodas, which we really enjoyed). Other than these minor opportunities for improvement, we had great hotel rooms with very nice views (important to us), good weather, good food, good guides and drivers (who seemed satisfied with the tips we gave them), and we were taken to all the places agreed-to on the itinerary. For those who do not feel adventurous enough to be on their own in Vietnam, we do strongly recommend TNK travel as an ideal, reasonably-priced solution. You can count on them for a memorable and pleasant trip. One final comment, although you can pay everything in Vietnam in US dollars or Euros, prices are cheaper if you pay in Dongs (local currency, FX at 17.3 VND/USD on the average during our trip, calculated at 15 by the stores if you pay in USD). Also a word of caution, Vietnam Airlines only allows 20 kg for a checked suitcase and 7 kg for a carry-on so travel light……
If you are thinking of going and have any question about our experience, don’t hesitate to contact me at dkane@mmm.com.
Our sincere thanks to MM. Trinh, Danh and the entire TNK staff for a wonderful trip. The Kane family (Austin, TX, USA)
George KowalskiFlight information to Vietnam (Sep)
Dear Hang! Our Vietnam adventure is coming to an end. We are very happy with our holiday, how beautiful Vietnam is and the itinery you prepared and service we got from your company and your guides. We will strongly recommend your company to our friends in both Australia and Poland. Myself an my brother want to revisit Vietnam in Last thing we would like to confirm is the late checking out in our last hotel Silk Path in Hanoi, which you mentioned in one of your emails. I will appreciate if you will confirm that with the hotel.
Ron & Myra SuchThanks
We had a lot of dealings with Miss Hang Vo (TNK Travel) at De Tham Street, HCM City. We found Miss Vo to be the best Agent we have come across in Vietnam. She was very helpful in every way and helped us with any problems we had. We have travelled in Vietnam on 6 different occasions, and never had better service. We recommend Miss Vo to anyone worldwide for any dealings you have in South East Asia.. We met her personally in HCM and found her to be very charming, she is now a friend for life.
Ms. Frances Ann ReidTrain Booking HCM - NT ( Oct ) / Ms. Frances Ann Reid
Thank you so much for your excellent service on my recent trip to Vietnam. I booked train tickets, an air ticket, a day tour and stays in 2 hotels with your company and everything went really well. The staff in the office in HCMC were really friendly and helpful and I will recommend TNK Travel to anyone heading to Vietnam, Warm regards, Frances Reid.
Shaun McCreeHalong Bay - Huong Hai Junk
Went in middle of February 2008 when the weather was bitterly cold & misty. This was a real shame as everyone agreed it would have been a fabulous two days otherwise.
peter wellsThanking Dat
Hi Dat, Hope biz. is booming. We ve recommended lots of friends here to contact TNK and Guide Dat. We enjoyed our holiday in your lovely country. Be careful on your busy roads - we will never forget our enlightening experience of Vietnam with you. Cheers and thanks from Ozzie mates Heather & Peter Wells
Sapa stunning trek and great combination of home stay & eco-lodge
At an elevation of 1,600 meters, Sapa is a delightful former French hill station situated in the mountainous region of Vietnam's northwest, close to the Chinese border. The region is home to many ethnic minority groups, each wearing traditional and colorful attire. This trip includes a trek through the hills and valleys of the Sapa region, discovering several different minorities along the way. You will experience overnight accommodation in the hospitable villages of Dzay and Tay ethnic minorities. Round off the trek with a nice stay in Topas Eco Lodge. The apparent hardships are worth it though as we walk through some of the most spectacular scenery that Vietnam has to offer and experience unique villages culture.
Highlights:
Itinerary at a glance:
Night 1: Night train to Lao Cai
8.00pm: Transfer from your hotel to Hanoi Railway Station for the night train to Lao Cai. Overnight in AC soft sleeper wooden cabin.
Day 1: Lao Cai – Sapa ( B / L / D ) 4 – 5 hour trek and home stay
Arrive in Lao Cai around 6.00 am. Welcome by our tour guide in Lao Cai and transferred to Sapa. Breakfast in local restaurant. After breakfast we can pack up for the trek or stroll in Sapa market walk around the town. We will begin our trek at 10 am. We will trek on small trails down hill to Muong Hoa Valley and visit LaoChai village of Black H’mong and Ta Van village of the Dzay minority groups. Picnic lunch on the way. We will reach Tavan, a village of Dzay minority around 4.30 pm. Dinner and overnight homestay in a local house.
Day 2: Trek and home stay ( B / L / D ) 5 hour trek and homestay
Breakfast at the home stay. We leave Ta Van Village at 8.30 am for Giang Ta Chai, a village of Red Dzao minority. Today we trek through thick bamboo forest and enjoy great view of rice terraces. Around noon we reach Giang Ta Chai, visit to the village and have picnic lunch by Muong Hoa Rive. In the afternoon we cross the river and head to Ban Ho, a village of Tay minority group. We will have dinner and overnight in a traditional house-on-stilt of the Tay in Ban Ho village.
Day 3: Topas Eco Lodge ( B / L / _ )
After breakfast at the home stay we leave Ban Ho and walk 3 km on good trails to our bus. Short transfer to Topas Eco Lodge. Upon arrival in Topas Eco Lodge we check in hotel and relax in the eco lodge. Lunch in the eco lodge. Dinner on guests account. Overnight in Topas Eco lodge.
Day 4: Back to Hanoi ( B )
Breakfast in Topas Eco Lodge. Relax in the eco lodge and take the car at 11.30 am to Sapa Town. Leave luggage at my office then free to explore the town. We can visit Ham Rong Park or shop in Sapa market. In the late afternoon we take a bus ride to Lao Cai for night train back to Hanoi. Overnight in an air-conditioned soft sleeper wooden cabin
Day 5: Arrive in Hanoi. Trip completes
Arrive in Hanoi around 5.00 am. Trip completes at the train station.
Tour price includes:
Tour price excludes: