Send six things, and the reply will actually be useful
A first enquiry that contains six pieces of information gets a real answer. One that says “we would like to see Vietnam and Cambodia next year” gets a set of questions back, which costs both of us four days. This page lists the six, says what comes back and when, gives the time zone, and states plainly the things we do not do so that nobody wastes an email on them.
Six things to put in the first message
None of these has to be final. Every one of them can change later. But an enquiry containing all six can be answered with a routing sketch instead of a questionnaire, and that is the difference between a useful reply and a polite one.
- Your dates, or at minimum the month. The month decides more than anything else on this route — which beach works, whether central Vietnam is in flood season, whether Angkor is 35 to 40 °C, whether northern Thailand is under burning-season smoke. If the dates are fixed by school terms or a wedding, say so.
- How many are travelling, and their ages. Ages matter for children under about twelve, for teenagers, and for anybody who would rather not climb temple stairs. A party of seven spanning three generations is a different build from a party of seven friends.
- How many days you have, door to door. Count the flights home. Twelve days is our floor and most people underestimate what the long-haul legs take out of a fortnight.
- Which countries, if you have decided. If you have not, say that instead — it is a perfectly good answer and it lets us shape the sketch around the days rather than the map.
- Budget per person per day, land only. That means hotels, private car and driver, national guides, flights inside the region, entrance fees and breakfast, excluding your international flights. Our band runs USD 250 to 500. A number here is not a commitment, it is what stops us sending you an itinerary priced at twice what you had in mind.
- The one place you refuse to miss. Everyone has one. Naming it early means the rest of the route is built around it rather than colliding with it in the third draft.
If you can add a sentence about what you do not want — no early starts, no long drives, nothing that involves a boat, no city longer than three nights — the first sketch will land far closer to what you actually want.
What happens next, and when
Three stages, in this order, with the same planner on your file throughout.
| Stage | What you get | When |
|---|---|---|
| Reply | A real answer from the planner who will handle the trip, with any questions the enquiry left open | Within one working day |
| Routing sketch | Countries in order, nights per stop, which legs fly and which drive, and the land-only price band | Within three working days |
| Named-hotel itinerary | Day by day, hotels named with room categories, drive times, inclusions and the cancellation ladder | After the sketch is agreed |
The sketch is the cheap stage to argue in, and it is meant to be argued with. Most parties change it at least twice before anybody names a hotel, and changing it costs nothing. Once hotels are named, changes start to cost time because each one has to be re-checked for availability in the month you are travelling.
Nothing is held and nothing is charged until you have the named-hotel itinerary and have said yes to it. The full sequence, including deposits and the cancellation ladder, is set out on how to book.
Where we are, and what that means for your clock
We work in Indochina Time, GMT+7. That is the zone for Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh City, Phnom Penh, Vientiane and Bangkok, and none of these countries observes daylight saving, so our clock does not move during the year. Yours probably does, which is why the gaps below are given as ranges.
What the gap looks like from where you are
- Europe. London is six hours behind us in British Summer Time and seven hours behind in winter; most of continental Europe is five or six. Write in your morning and the reply is written the following morning our time, so it usually lands in your inbox before lunch the next day.
- North America. The east coast is eleven or twelve hours behind us, the west coast fourteen or fifteen. Our working day is your night. This is the reason we do the substance in writing rather than on the telephone — a scheduled call is possible and works best at 08:00 to 10:00 our time, which is your previous evening.
- Australia and New Zealand. Sydney is three or four hours ahead of us and Auckland five or six. Our office hours overlap yours for most of the afternoon, which makes these the easiest calls to arrange.
For anything urgent while you are travelling with us, you are not dealing with this clock at all — each country has a manager on a local number, given to you before departure and printed in the travel documents.
Hanoi, Vietnam
How to reach us
The details below are the only ones we use. Anything arriving from an address that is close to but not exactly one of these is not from us, and that matters most around payment time: we never change bank details by email, and any message appearing to do so should be checked by telephone against the numbers here before you act on it.
Written enquiries get better answers than telephone ones, because the planner can check availability, seasons and flight times before replying instead of guessing out loud. If you would rather talk first, send two or three times that suit you and we will confirm one.
How far ahead to write
For a journey between mid-November and early February — the only window that is dry across all four countries at once, and the reason most enquiries name it — be in touch by July.
The constraint is not our capacity. It is a small number of specific rooms and cabins. The Lan Ha cabins worth having are a handful on each small vessel rather than forty-six on a large one, and they are taken early for the December and January dates. The best rooms in Siem Reap go the same way, and so do the sea-facing categories on Phu Quoc over the New Year. By September, planning a Christmas or New Year trip means choosing from what is left rather than from what you want.
Rough lead times we work to
- Mid-November to early February: enquire by July, book by August or early September.
- March to May: three to four months is usually enough, and it is a good window for Laos and the Gulf coast if you accept the heat at Angkor.
- June to August: three months, and this is the Koh Samui season rather than the Andaman one.
- September to early November: shortest lead times of the year, because it is typhoon and flood season on the central Vietnamese coast and we will say so before you commit to it.
Which month suits which part of the route is set out country by country on when to go, and the bay itself is covered on the Lan Ha Bay page. If you would rather start from a shape than from a date, the twelve journeys are the quickest way to tell us what you want.
What we cannot help with
Four things come up often enough to be worth stating before you write, rather than in a reply that takes a day to reach you.
- Flight-only bookings. We book the flights inside your journey — the regional and domestic legs that hold the route together — but we do not sell international tickets on their own, and we are not the cheapest place to buy them.
- Visa applications on your behalf. We will tell you exactly what your nationality needs and where the official portal is: the Vietnamese e-visa, open to all nationalities for up to 90 days and required for US, Canadian, Australian and New Zealand passports; the Cambodian e-visa at USD 30 plus USD 6 processing, plus the separate and mandatory Cambodia e-Arrival form; the Lao visa on arrival at roughly USD 30 to 45 with the Lao Digital Immigration Form; and the free Thailand Digital Arrival Card, filed within 72 hours of arrival. We will not file any of them for you, and we will tell you when a site is charging for something that is free.
- Trips under twelve days. This one is firm. Other operators build short packages properly and we would build them badly.
- Anything in Myanmar. Not as a leg, not as an extension, not as a day trip.
Two more that are worth knowing: our guides work in English only, and we decline enquiries budgeting under USD 200 per person per day for land arrangements rather than quoting a version with the guide days stripped out. The reasoning behind both is on the about page, and what a day actually buys is on pricing.
Send the six things
Dates or a month, how many travelling and their ages, how many days, countries if decided, budget per person per day land only, and the one place you refuse to miss.
Questions travellers ask most
What should a first enquiry contain?
Dates or at least a month, how many are travelling and their ages, how many days you have door to door, which countries if you have decided, a budget per person per day for land arrangements only, and the one place you refuse to miss. All six can change later, but with all six we can answer with a routing sketch instead of a questionnaire.
How quickly will you reply?
Within one working day for the first reply, and within three working days for a routing sketch showing countries in order, nights per stop and which legs fly. The named-hotel itinerary follows once the sketch is agreed. Nothing is charged until you have that itinerary and have said yes to it.
When should we write for a trip in December or January?
By July. The constraint is a small number of specific rooms rather than our capacity: the Lan Ha cabins worth having are a handful on each small vessel, and the best rooms in Siem Reap go early for that window. By September you are choosing from what is left.
Can you apply for our visas?
No. We will tell you precisely what your nationality needs and link the official portal for each country, including the mandatory arrival forms for Cambodia, Laos and Thailand, but the applications are yours to file. We will also tell you when a third-party site is charging for something that is free.
Read next
Tell us about the journey you have in mind
Dates, party size and the places you care about are enough to start. You get a draft route and an indicative price, not a brochure.