11 Day Into the World of Vietnam Culinary Tour with Yoga Experience in Ho Chi Minh

Day 1: Ho Chi Minh City - Arrival

Arrival in Ho Chi Minh City, the most bustling metropolis of South Vietnam, you’re welcomed by our driver (no guide) and transferred to your hotel. Following is leisure time for refreshment after a long flight. Overnight in Ho Chi Minh City.

• Hotel: Aristo Hotel - Premier Deluxe room
• Meal: none

Day 2: Ho Chi Minh City - Cooking Class, Cyclo Ride

Today you will discover Southern Vietnam cooking style. Meet your chef and visit a colorful market to approach to culinary aspect and the culture of Vietnamese gastronomy. You will explore Vietnamese ingredients, learn more about Vietnamese food and its spices. Then gather at your cooking center where the chef would introduce you to the dishes and the ingredients which will be used. Put an apron on, everybody would be busy to put their hands-on cutting and chopping, preparing food for cooking.

Carving fruit or vegetables is also offered by Chef to amaze your dish with its beautiful presentation! Throughout the course, you have the opportunity to observe all the skills of the chef and the tricks that can achieve any recipe, even those who seemed the most difficult.

However, if only observe, it’s not enough! The chef would like you to create it yourself, to repeat the same gestures. Finally, savor your own creation. Enjoy this moment for sharing experience with Chef. After learning how Saigon people cook their food and getting to know how the food tastes, continue to explore Saigon’s French gothic architecture by the local traditional vehicle of cyclo or rickshaw ride. Ride cyclo slowly through Saigon’s French quarter with the significant buildings of Opera House, Notre Dame Cathedral and Old Centre Post Office. Overnight in Ho Chi Minh City

• Hotel: Aristo Hotel - Premier Deluxe room
• Meal: breakfast, lunch

Day 3: Saigon - Yoga Class

Free your mind and body with a yoga class. Regular exercise can improve mood, increase self-esteem, reduce anxiety, promote sleep, reduce high blood pressure, help weight loss while making you look younger and more radiant. Start today with the first step toward optimum health. Return to your hotel with a healthy body and peaceful mind, take a relaxation or walk around for shopping. Overnight in Ho Chi Minh City.

• Hotel: Aristo Hotel - Premier Deluxe room
• Meal: breakfast

Day 4: Ho Chi Minh City - Hue - Zen House

Breakfast at your hotel and transfer to the airport for a flight to Hue. Landing in Hue, you’re welcomed by Little Vietnam Tours guide and transfer to Cat Tuong Quan Zen House where tranquil living space, pure living environment, elegant lifestyle will help you to find your spiritual retreat.

Upon arrival, there will be greetings from Cat Tuong Quan by Qigong performance, introductions of architecture and the spiritual meaning of Cat Tuong Quan, the introduction of 4 movements of Qigong, enjoy brown rice-tea, dried ginger jam after qigong lesion, watch instruction of meditation and experience meditation, discuss culture, meditation, etc with the owner, spiritual retreat before lunch, enjoy lunch, wash hands with herb cream and do walking meditation follow by farewell and transferred to your hotel in Hue. Check-in and overnight.

• Hotel: Moonlight Hotel - Deluxe River View room
• Meal: breakfast, veggie lunch

Day 5: Hue’s highlights - Hoi An

Breakfast will be at your hotel. You will visit the Imperial Citadel of Hue, Minh Mang King’s Tomb (typical formal oriental style), and Thien Mu Pagoda that is Hue’s best-preserved religious monument. It is a historic pagoda with its seven-story tower on the banks of the Perfume River, apart from their scenic riverside and hilltop location. After lunch at your own expense, you will travel to Hoi An along the centre coast of Vietnam with amazing scenery of Hai Van Pass and Lang Co Beach. Arrival in Hoi An, check-in your hotel and overnight.

• Hotel: Phu Thinh Resort & Spa - Junior Suite room
• Meal: breakfast

Day 6: Hoi An - Cooking class and street food (breakfast and lunch)

After breakfast, gather at the Hai Scout Café in Hoi An’s old streets to meet the chef. Visit a local market to buy the ingredients to be used in the cooking lesson later. Board a boat for a leisurely cruise along the Thu Bon River to the Red Bridge Cooking School. On arrival, explore the school’s herb and vegetable garden, before learning about some of Hoi An and Vietnam’s well-known dishes, which are a mix of Vietnamese and Chinese cuisines. The cooking lesson lasts about 2 hours - each dish is first demonstrated by the Red Bridge’s chef before you prepare the same dish by yourself. The class also contains a brief introduction to Vietnamese food carvings (plate decoration). After the lesson, sit down and taste what you have cooked. Then the boat will take you back to Hoi An town.

In the afternoon, take a guided walking tour around Hoi An Ancient Town. Along with the walking, you will have chance to taste some local treats such as Hoi An bread (Bánh Mì Hội An) at well-know Madame Khanh or Bánh Mì Phượng, grilled pork and rice paper wraps and rolls, Cao Lầu - Hoi An’s noodle grilled pork, noodle, salad, herbals, and bean sprouts. Eat and taste as much as street food you can. Overnight in Hoi An.

• Hotel: Phu Thinh Resort & Spa - Junior Suite room
• Meal: breakfast & lunch

Day 7: Hoi An - Free

A free day in Hoi An to explore the town! Overnight in Hoi An.

• Hotel: Phu Thinh Resort & Spa - Junior Suite room
• Meal: breakfast & lunch

Day 8: Hoi An - Hanoi - Yoga class & Street food

Breakfast at your hotel and be free at leisure. In the afternoon, board a flight to Hanoi. Upon arrival, you’re greeted by our guide and transferred downtown. Check-in your hotel and be free for relaxing.

Then you will be transferred to a peaceful and small alley of Hanoi where you will meet your yoga master and have a 2 hour private class of yoga and meditation. Base on your level, your yoga teacher will choose different styles for you to practice.

By sunset and when the weather is cooler (in Summer), meet your guide again and walk through 36 narrow, bustling and colorful streets of Hanoi’s Old Quarter. Hanoi’s Old Quarter is a heaven of street foods where you can taste different dishes including papaya wrap and rolls for salad, a Banh Xeo Pancake for an appetizer, a bowl of beef noodle on Ly Quoc Su Street for the main course, a sweet Che for dessert, and an egg coffee before ending the 5-course meal. Overnight in Hanoi.

• Hotel: La Belle View Hotel - Deluxe city view room
• Meal: breakfast

Day 9: Hanoi - Lan Ha Bay (breakfast, lunch & dinner)

After an early breakfast, take a 2.5-hour drive to Lan Ha Bay. Upon arrival around noon, transfer to a cruise for traveling around Lan Ha Bay with a delicious local seafood lunch served on board. The cruise passes through the limestone rocks and islets in many unique and funny shapes. Before dinner and after a half-day of sightseeing, you will have a cooking class on the boat. Savor what you have cooked as a snack or appetizer! Again your dinner is served on board. In the evening, enjoy night fishing, drinks, and overnight on board anchored in a peaceful bay.

• Hotel: Calypso Cruise - deluxe room
• Meal: breakfast, lunch, dinner

Day 10: Lan Ha Bay - Hanoi (brunch)

Why not rise early to witness the bay at its very best whilst enjoying an invigorating Tai Chi session on the sundeck; after which Little Vietnam Tours serve the breakfast. Upon completing breakfast continue your journey and head out to explore the bay in the area where Ao Ech is situated. You enjoy on your own for kayaking to discover the hidden charm of Lan Ha Bay. Brunch will be served while doing further cruising to explore the beauties of the Bay before returning to the Wharf. Disembark the boat and return to Hanoi. Overnight in Hanoi.

• Hotel: La Belle View Hotel - Deluxe city view room
• Meal: breakfast, lunch

Day 11: Hanoi - Departure (breakfast)

Breakfast at your hotel and you will have free time for shopping or relaxing before transferring to the airport for your departure flight.

• Cyclo tour in Ho Chi Minh City
• Cooking classes in Ho Chi Minh City & Hoi An
• Yoga classes in Ho Chi Minh City & Hanoi
• Full day Qigong & meditation in Hue
• Hue city tour
• Street food tour in Hoi An and Hanoi
• 2 days/1 night boat cruise in Lan Ha Bay

Ha Long Bay

The scenery of Ha Long Bay is unique and relaxing, with thousands of small limestone karst outcroppings dotting the 1500 square kilometers bay. Most of them small and vertical, which has kept humans from ever living there, and others larger, that have sustained fishing villages over the past 200 years.

You’ll love watching the locals set off to fish in their traditional wooden boats, hearing the single-engine putt-putt-putt-putt pierce the quiet while docked, watching birds launch as the lush green islands glide by, and just relaxing on a boat.

There are different ways to experience Halong Bay, its neighboring Bai Tu Long Bay, and Lan Ha Bay. Both have the same beautiful experience, but Bai Tu Long Bay and Lan Ha Bay are less touristic and hide more blue lagoons, untouched beaches, and caverns.

Hanoi

When you step off the bus in the old quarter of Hanoi and wander through the streets, you will find yourself in awe of just about everything. The warmth of the old buildings, the simplicity of life as women and men sell fruit off the back of their bicycles, wearing traditional cone shaped hats, happy, relaxed, and welcoming.

There is so much to see in Hanoi, walking the old quarter and through the old city walls from Hoan Kiem Lake, Silver Street, Hang Ngan, Hang Dao, Dong Xuan Market, Hat Street, Bronze Street, etc. Strolling around Hoan Kiem lake and across the brightly painted red The Huc bridge, the atypical Ho Chi Minh museum, and Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum.

There is the One-Pillar pagoda and the Tran Quoc Pagoda for a taste of Buddhist culture and Hoa Lo prison for a glance of the American-Vietnamese war. There are many war sights and it is a true experience to learn about that period from the Vietnamese’ perspective. But the real sight in Hanoi are the people.

Ho Chi Minh City

Ho Chi Minh City is formerly known as (and still referred to by locals as) Saigon. It has a different weather than Hanoi and people’s lifestyle is faster and more open. But Saigon changes its pace when the dark falls. It becomes more lively and charming at night.

There is a big gap in the temperature between day and night time. Wind from the Saigon river cools down the city in the evening. Ho Chi Minh City’s must-see attractions are mostly within walking distance and they will take you a half day to visit.

Reunification Palace, War Remnant Museum, History Museum, Ben Thanh Market, Opera House, Notre Dame Cathedral, and Saigon Old Post Office are all located in the district 1. If you have a full day, you can extend your visit to district 5, including Chinatown, Thien Hau Cantonese temple, and Fito Chinese medicine Museum.

Hoi An

Hoi An has many things to offer. You can come to the town, find an isolated hotel / village resort for relaxation, get rid of the stress of busy life and work. With the combination of both sightseeing and beach, you can stay here for three nights up to a week or more.

If you come to the town for sightseeing only, you can spend at least two nights. The charming ancient town of Hoi An itself will take you a half day to explore. Its Japanese Covered Bridge, Chinese Assembly Hall, Chinese old houses dating back to the early nineteenth century, house of an artisan making lanterns, a local market, and many more are all worth visiting.

One night can't be enough for Hoi An as you never feel bored with this town, even if your time is only spent wandering around the streets, sipping coffee in the old-style coffee shops, and looking at the daily life of local people or tasting local street foods.

Hue

Hue, in the center of Vietnam, can be reached by an 11-hour overnight train or a one-hour flight from Hanoi. Night trains help you save time and also save money for a hotel night. Hue is famous for its history and natural beauty such as the Imperial Citadel, old temples, romantic Perfume River, and king’s tombs that reflect a personal perspective and knowledge of each king about art, Fengshui theory, architecture, and nature.

The city is divided into two parts, Northern and Southern, by the Perfume River. The Northern bank is the location of the Imperial Citadel, Thien Mu pagoda, and King Minh Mang tomb. Meanwhile, six other king’s tombs are on the Southern bank of the river, from upstream to downstream.

Hue is the only city in Vietnam that has the harmonious combination of architecture, culture, and nature. The city is protected by Ngu Binh Mountain and fertilized by the Perfume River. The best way to visit Hue and learn about its historical stories is with an escorted tour by private car and an experienced guide. You will find Hue much more interesting when you know the stories hidden behind the moss walls. Each tomb is a full life story of its king, his knowledge, and his rule.

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During this holiday, you will be provided with 10 breakfasts, four lunches, and one dinner in the best local restaurants or on a boat in Ha Long Bay (food only). Two mineral water bottles will also be provided for each full day sightseeing.

• Breakfast and accommodation in a twin/double room
• Travel in an appropriate private air-conditioned vehicle with an experienced safe driver
• Travel by cruise shuttle bus from Hanoi to Lan Ha Bay and back
• The services of an experienced local English-speaking guide on touring days
• Boat cruises as specified in the program comply with current safety regulations
• Where necessary, entry fees and permission to enter border areas for all visits mentioned in the program
• Lunches and dinners as specified in the itinerary in the best local restaurants or on a boat in Lan Ha Bay
• Cooking class in Ho Chi Minh City & Hoi An
• Yoga class in Ho Chi Minh City & Hanoi
• Two domestic flights: Ho Chi Minh City- Hue and Danang to Hanoi, including taxes and checked luggage
• Bottle mineral water and wet wipe in the car during the tour
• VAT and other taxes

• International flight tickets and airport tax
• Other meals, except as specified above
• Drinks, gratuities and personal expenses
• Camera fees (if any)
• Insurance

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• A reservation requires a deposit of 14% of the total price.
• The deposit is non-refundable, if the booking is cancelled.
• The rest of the payment should be paid on arrival.