Vietnam – and our very own location expert

What do the items in the opening photo have in common? Yes – they are all about Vietnam, but more importantly, they have all been written by my nephew Joshua Zukas, who is a Hanoi-based writer covering travel, culture, architecture and innovation in Asia. And we have benefitted hugely from his guidance and advice in planning our next adventure in Vietnam. You’ll hear a lot more about him and his work if you follow our travel blog.

Our trip to Vietnam was delayed for three years because of Covid, so we are making up for it by going for the month of October. We begin our journey with three days in Chiang Mai (in Thailand) to visit Josh who is spending time there learning Thai (as you would). We then fly with him to Hanoi and embark on a series of adventures – a holiday in several parts.

First, we’ll travel with Josh and Bien Nguyen, Josh’s partner, who is a wonderful amateur photographer, in the North-East of Vietnam up to the Chinese border. We’ll then join our friend Nikhil Pandit in Hanoi for a few days, before travelling with him to the mountains west of Hanoi. At that point, we have a Plan A and Plan B, depending on the weather so you’ll have to wait and see where we decide to go.

As ever, it would be great to have your company for the trip. But if it’s not what you need or want right now, it’s easy to unsubscribe – details should be provided in the email alert you received when I posted this blog (and you’ll be practised at unsubscribing, I am sure).

Check out the map showing our proposed routes – you’ll find the link to the map in the menu at the top of this page as well as through the link. There’s also a map of the places we hope to stay.

We promise pictures of rice fields, Vietnamese ethnic groups, perhaps mist and rain, beautiful food and, I suspect, many motorbikes (including us on the back of one or two, even). And of course we’d love comments which we promise to respond to. We love your comments, questions, requests and the sense of travelling in your company – so thank you in advance.