Travel Tips--Vietnam

I have one more final post after this one.  The formatting got messed up.  I finally organized the dates on my blog. They got screwed up due to the delays in posting.

It was an awesome trip but there were a few things that I learned. First of all, it was easy to travel to and from Vietnam. If you're planning on using the train within Vietnam, the earlier you book the better, because it is a cheap and popular way to get around. If you're traveling in a group, you can get a sleeper car for all of you, and if you go overnight, you save on hotel prices. Plane rides within Vietnam are cheap too, especially if you book ahead of time. There are a few airlines that serve within the country, but not all cities have lots of flights going in and out. Dong Hoi has just one a day to Hanoi for example. Air travel there is just like it is here but sometimes they don't use etickets. Also, their carry-on bag policy is very restrictive. They go around before boarding and take peoples bags to check them in. Don't expect to carry anything on that weighs more than about 15 pounds and is no bigger than a large book backpack.

What to wear? It is a little different there. Westerners would wear whatever they want, like short shorts and tank tops. But they don't wear those much, so I'm sure you stand out more, and not in a great way. Jeans and T-shirts were OK, but I usually wore a polo. They dress fairly conservatively there, especially in the North.

It is a good idea to commit to memory how to say things like Thank You, Hello, Where's the toilet, Excuse Me, etc. People really appreciate it, even if you butcher the language somewhat. It was really hard for me to memorize their words for any length of time, so I had some written down. I knew how to say 'do you speak english' which was a good way to get a conversation going. I had someone teach me how to say 'this is a great restaurant' and 'I slept well' but no way I could remember it right now.

I was able to do everything on my iPhone and iPad. I almost got a Vietel sim card to access data and voice over there. They're cheap and easy to get. But I was afraid it would screw something up on my phone so I resisted it. You can access WiFi just about anywhere there for free. All hotels were free, and most cafes and eateries had it for free as well--just ask for their password. Sometimes I could find unlocked WiFi just walking around. I never got hacked as far as I could tell. I used a VPN service I subscribe to to access US websites like Facebook and others that are sometimes locked down over there. About midway through the trip, I could no longer access to view my blog without the VPN on. Weird. Posting to it was no problem though because the posts were just emails to a special email address I set up in Blogger so it was easy. I don't know what happened when google locked me out of everything, but I suspect it was because I was using VPN and non VPN at the same time so it probably triggered some spam algorithm.

You should defiantly have a skype account pre-loaded with some credits before you travel anywhere. It has a good iphone app. You can call or text anywhere as long as you're on WiFi--any country, even within Vietnam. That saved me many times, especially when I had to call my own cell phone's voicemail to get the google code to unlock my email. Plus, it was nice to be able to call hotels and airlines rather than counting on the email all the time. Although they were pretty good about answering me that way. Other than that, facetime audio and facetime video worked like a champ to other i-devices.

 I didn't update my apps or download new ones on my phone or ipad before I left, thinking I would just do it there. That was a mistake. In Vietnam, for some reason they don't allow you to update or get new apps unless your itunes account has a Vietnamese bank card or credit card registered to it. I couldn't figure out a way around that. I suspect it is an Apple limitation but who knows. Not even my VPN could get around that. I really wanted to have the Translate app installed. I saw lots of people using it to communicate with Vietnamese who couldn't speak much English (or pretended not to).

 Power plugs in Vietnam are 220 volts, which is no problem for most cell phones and pads. But the plug itself could be a problem. They use a two-prong round plug rather than our flat ones, but almost all of the outlets there were dual-use meaning they also took our flat plugs. I had a universal power adapter with USB plugs on it, but it literally lit up with smoke and sparks the first time I plugged it in (made in China); luckily it was fused so that's all that blew. I didn't replace it since I didn't need to. But when I got to Hong Kong, they have a wide two prong round plug thing that wouldn't take my iphone power box. (but in the bathroom they had a hairdryer mount that would take it for electric razors, so I was saved). I will be shopping for a simple travel adapter that is small just so I can plug in my devices to charge. I already use a power box that holds two USB cables, and several 7 foot cables to go with it since there aren't a lot of outlets in rooms.

I went there with almost no preparation, which isn't like me, but I got a lot done in two weeks. It's not like going to Europe or some other places where you can get by easier or seems more familiar. But it was much easier than I thought it would be.