Vietnam on foot
We run four treks. Three of them are in the northern limestone, one crosses the dry grassland ridges above the south coast. All of them are walked, not driven, with a guide who walks the whole way with you.
Three ways into this site
Most people arrive here at one of three stages, and each one needs a different page. Pick the row that describes you rather than reading the whole site in order.
You know you want to walk
Go to the four treks. Each page carries a real day-by-day, a price table by party size, and a section saying who the trek is wrong for.
You know the place, not the trip
Go to the regions. Ha Giang, Sa Pa and Pu Luong each get a page about the place itself, including the parts that have been spoiled.
You are still working out the shape
Go to when to go or private or group. Those two questions decide more about your trip than the route does.
What we sell, in one paragraph
Two products. A set-departure group trek, where you join a fixed date with up to nine other people and pay the published price. And a private trek, where your party has the guide, the vehicle and the homestay rooms to itself, dates are yours, and the price falls as the party grows. Nothing else. We do not sell cruises, we do not sell city tours, and we do not sell the fourteen-day north-to-south loop that most Vietnamese operators put on the front of their brochure.
A trek here means walking days of four to eight hours on paths that vehicles cannot use, sleeping in village houses and small guesthouses, and eating what the host family cooks. It does not mean a two-hour stroll from a minibus to a viewpoint and back. If that is what you want, we are the wrong company and you will be happier with a general operator.
| Trek | Days | Walking | Grade | From |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ha Giang, the limestone plateau | 6 | 59 km over 4.5 days | 3 of 5 | USD 860 |
| Sa Pa, the Muong Hoa valley | 4 | 45 km over 3.5 days | 2 of 5 | USD 430 |
| Pu Luong, terraces and waterwheels | 3 | 32 km over 3 days | 2 of 5 | USD 295 |
| Ta Nang to Phan Dung | 3 | 55 km over 3 days | 4 of 5 | USD 340 |
Why book a walking trip with a walking company
Every general tour operator in Hanoi will sell you a Sa Pa trek. The difference is not enthusiasm, it is four mechanics that cost us money and that a general operator has no reason to pay for.
The guide walks
Our guide is on the path with you for the whole day, carrying the first-aid kit and the radio. A driver-guide who meets you at the far end is cheaper and is what most quotes at this price actually contain. Ask any operator directly and watch how the answer is phrased.
Ten walkers, hard limit
Above ten, the group splits on every climb, the slowest walker is alone for an hour at a time, and homestays start putting people in a second village. We turn away the eleventh booking rather than move the ceiling.
Named houses, not star ratings
Every night on every itinerary names the village and the family. A quote that says “homestay, standard” can be moved to whichever house is free that week, and it usually is.
We say when not to walk
We close Ta Nang from June to October because the stream crossings flood, and we tell Sa Pa enquiries in July that the terraces are green and the paths are mud. Both cost us bookings every year.
What it costs, roughly
Prices below are per person, twin share, land only, and they fall as your party grows because one guide and one vehicle get divided by more people. The pricing page breaks the number down to supplier level so you can compare us against a cheaper quote line by line.
| Party size | Set-departure group | Private trek |
|---|---|---|
| 1 walker | Published price, you join others | Roughly 2.4x the group price |
| 2 walkers | Published price each | Roughly 1.5x the group price each |
| 3 - 4 | Published price each | Roughly 1.2x |
| 5 - 8 | Published price each | About the same |
| 9 - 10 | Published price each | Slightly cheaper than the group price |
At nine or ten walkers a private trek costs less per person than joining our own set departure, because you are already paying for a whole guide and a whole vehicle. If you are that many, book private and ignore the group dates.
Send us the dates and the party
We reply with a real itinerary and a price, not a brochure. One working day.
Who we are not for
Four kinds of traveller write to us every week and would be better served elsewhere. Reading this list now saves both of us a fortnight of email.
- Anyone who wants Vietnam end to end in two weeks. That trip is mostly transport, and a general operator does it better than we would.
- Groups above ten. We do not run two guides and call it one group.
- Travellers who want a five-star hotel each night. The best beds on our routes are clean stilt houses with shared washing, and no amount of money changes that in Kho Muong.
- Anyone booking inside seven days for Ha Giang. The travel permit and the homestay chain do not compress, and we would rather refuse than rush it.
Pictures from the four routes
Questions travellers ask most
How fit do I need to be?
The number that matters is not distance, it is ascent in a day. Our easiest route, Pu Luong, has one day of 780 m of climbing over 15 km. Ha Giang has a day of 900 m over 17 km. Ta Nang has 22 km with a full pack day in the middle.
If you can walk six hours on a hilly path at home, carrying two litres of water, and do it again the next morning without a rest day, you can do any of the four. If you cannot, say so on the form and we will tell you which one still works.
Do you run treks we cannot see on this site?
Yes, but not many. We run private versions of these four routes at other lengths, and we occasionally run Y Ty, Bidoup and the Ba Be to Ban Gioc walk for returning clients. We do not list them because we cannot promise a guide for them every week, and listing a trek we cannot staff is how operators end up substituting.
Can you book my flights, my Halong cruise and my Hoi An hotel too?
No. We book the trek, the transport to and from it, and nothing else. Everyone in Hanoi sells the rest of it, usually better than we would, and adding a margin to somebody else's cruise is not a service.
What insurance do you require?
A policy that covers trekking to 2,000 m and includes medical evacuation by road and by air. We ask for the policy number and the emergency line before you travel and we do check it. Vietnam has no mountain rescue service in the sense that Europe does, and evacuation off the Ta Nang ridge is a paid helicopter or a very long carry.
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Tell us about the trek 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.