Reviews

We have just returned from our Angkor to the Bay tour and we had a great time, it was 'full on' with very little down time, especially at the start of the tour and I wish we had arrived a couple of days before the start so that we could have acclimatised a bit.

We had a great group of people, 18 in total, and we all got on really well which obviously helped to make the holiday.
The organisation was excellent, for example when it came to checking in to the hotels the keys were all ready and waiting for us, and quite often our bags had already been deposited in our room.

The guides were both local and were very knowledgeable, the Cambodian guide could have done well to give us more time to explore on our own at some of the sites but that's being super picky! Also on the Cambodian tour I do think that missing out the Killing Fields was a shame. The visit to the Genocide Museum was hard and I imagine that the Killing Fields would have been an equally difficult experience but it did feel like an omission especially as they were referenced by the guide a number of times.

The internal flights were all efficient as was the transport in general throughout the tour. All the drivers were great.

The Vietnamese guide was lovely and he even added in a couple of things at our request, it was a privilege to be able to see how people live day to day in Vietnam.

We opted to go on the extra tour to the Golden Hand Bridge and we are so pleased that we did. I wasn't expecting it to be in a theme park but that just made the whole thing even more fun. We were there very early so it wasn't too crowded, and we all agreed that we could have stayed at the park for much longer. (NB there is an additional charge for this excursion).

The food was plentiful but almost every meal was a set menu which wasn't ideal. Often there was far too much and there was so much waste - lunch and dinner were generally 4 course set menus. As a vegetarian the menus didn't vary too much: vegetable spring rolls, soup, tofu in some form or other and then a fruit platter. I think at the start of the tour (in Cambodia) we had the pretty much the same thing for lunch and dinner on two or three consecutive days which was a bit disappointing. The restaurants were all very accommodating: we had some people with special dietary requirements (not just vegetarians) and the restaurants all managed to provide the appropriate food There were a couple of days where we had Italian food and on the boat trip there was a buffet which was very welcome. Our guide was concerned that there weren't enough vegetarian options at the buffet and he arranged for additional items to be prepared which was a lovely touch. The food throughout was lovely (with only one exception) but by the end of the holiday we all just wanted to be able to make our own selections!

We did eat out in restaurants most evenings which often meant a very quick turnaround after a full day of sightseeing.

We were lucky with the weather and missed the flooding and the typhoons so were able to visit every destination on the itinerary unlike some other tourists we spoke to.

It's so hard to pick out the highlights because there were so many. I ticked off a bucket list item with the cruise on Halong Bay. The Cu Chi tunnels were fascinating. Hoi An was one of my favourites, just so pretty and Hanoi was brilliant (crossing the road was an experience). Our guide wasn't allowed to take us to Train Street but we found it ourselves and it's another must see.

In Cambodia Angkor Wat was stunning. We were in Phnom Penh during a festival and being out on the streets was a fabulous and unexpected bonus as the coach couldn't get through the traffic to take us to our restaurant so we had to walk.

I am so pleased that we chose to do this tour. It was our first trip with Wendy Wu and we can't fault the organisation. The biggest issue was the food and I suppose having too much rather too little is the better way around!

I would recommend the tour but I do feel that you need to be quite fit in order to ensure you don't miss out on some of the sightseeing. A few members of the group had to opt out of some things either because there were too many steps or because they just needed some time out due to the fast pace and full itinerary.

I would have rated the whole tour as 5 star but the bus which took us from Siem Reap to Phnom Penh was very tired, uncomfortable and old; is was too small to accommodate 12 clients, the driver, tour guide and ALL the luggage on the inside of the bus. The method of transport needs to be changed to reflect the price charged for the tour, it was not cheap but the bus was.

A fabulous holiday, and a great introduction to Cambodia and Vietnam. There were a few niggles, aren’t there always?

The good things:

The guides were knowledgable, friendly and efficient.
The hotels were splendid, large air conditioned rooms, with decent showers, and even a bath in one.
The itinerary was very extensive, and although it did some things I wasn’t interested in, it made up for it by going to places that were fabulous, that wouldn’t have occurred to me .
The group was a really good size, there were 17 of us.

The niggles:
The food, while always being of excellent quality was generally all very similar, which became boring. There were a few western meals, but I would rather have had a more varied Vietnamese diet. I am not vegetarian, but I don’t eat much meat, and having it twice a day for the whole holiday got pretty disheartening.

The visit to the museum in Phnom Penh was really emotive. The itinerary suggested we would be allowed to do this at our own pace, but instead we had a guide that wanted to forcefeed us information. I would have much rather been given an audio guide, which was available, and left to my own devices.

All in all a tremendous experience I would recommend to anyone.

Service rating :

The tour guides were very knowledgeable about their counties. The Cambodian guide, Sheiha, was brilliant giving dates with the history. The hotels were better than I expected, especially the Aviary, in Siem Reap. Transportation was well organised, but we had to spend a long than expected at Phnom Penh airport when leaving for home, because a couple on the tour had an earlier flight, and wanted to be at the airport an hour earlier than was suggested..

Product :

I thought the Laos tour was better balanced than the Cambodian one as it included some natural scenery and visits to ethnic villages. it would have been good if the Plain of Jars was addedd to the tour. In Cambodia I would have preferred to have time in a village, and just one night in Battambang- this to include the bamboo railway. Then two nights could have been spent in Phnom Penh - and include the Killing Fields. I understand that there are internal restrictions on what is possible to see in a limited time and that it is impossible to see everything, hence the excellent score as the holiday gave me an experience I shall never forget, and to me it was a 'test of faith', given that these countries have a huge population on poverty, and both have suffered, and are still suffering, extensively from many wars. It made me think how lucky I am to be where I live. Thank you

Service rating :

All ran smoothly. Our guides - Savoun in Siem Reap and Bora in Phnom Penh - were very pleasant and helpful, although their very strong Cambodian accents made them difficult to understand at times.

Product :

A fascinating country. The weather was far hotter than we anticipated - certainly a lot hotter than in Vietnam. Probably better to visit during the cooler months which we understand are November/December.

The hotel we stayed in in Phnom Penh was very poor. The room was not clean, there were cockroaches in the bathroom and the catering was mediocre.

A comment: you might consider because of the high level of congestion in Saigon and Hanoi, to select restaurants that require less travel time. Often coming back to the hotel after a busy event in the afternoon we would be faced by a restaurant journey (though often not far in distance) which could take up to 30 mins, and later a return journey. This always meant a rush for everyone, including our guide .