Mekong Luxury Cruise Upstream

Welcome to Vietnam!

The tour guide and a private comfortable car of THREELAND will be welcoming you at Noi Bai airport. Drive to the centre of Hanoi (around 35 minutes) and check-in hotel. Have a light tour to Hoan Kiem Lake - Ngoc Son Temple, hang around the Old Quarter of Hanoi on cyclo (a kind of three-wheel rickshaw) and visit the Temple of Literature, the 1st social university of Vietnam. The welcome Dinner is followed by a Show of Water Puppetry, a stage art created by the Vietnamese peasants. The show last more than an hour and is a wonderful opportunity to learn about some of Vietnam’s mythology, traditions and current customs. (Lunch at your own arrangement). Overnight in Hanoi.

From Hanoi, head East for 3 hours by our private car to reach Halong Bay, the pride of the Gulf of Tonkin, a Natural World Heritage as designated by UNESCO in 1994. We will stop en route in Dong Trieu, a ceramic village well-known for refined porcelain, precious celadon, crackle-glazed pottery and terracotta for domestic use and export. Upon arrival in Halong, we will take a big boat to cruise the Bay and reach the breathtaking views of Halong seascape and discover the magnificent beauty of this “Descending-dragon” bay. After a lunch of fresh seafood on the boat, we can visit the Surprising Grotto, stop for swimming and kayaking then back to the boat for dinner and overnight on the boat.

After breakfast, go on to kayak at Lan Ha Bay before returning to the Wharf of Halong, passing the Toad Rock, Cock-Fighting Rock, Sail Island. Arrive Halong Wharf at 11.00. Drive back to Hanoi by car with a stopover for lunch at Hong Ngoc Charity Centre. Go straight to the airport for the afternoon flight to Saigon.

Welcome to Saigon and transfer to your hotel to check in. Overnight in Saigon

Our day will begin with a visit to Cu Chi Tunnels, one of the few remaining monuments to the fierce Vietnam War. We can even crawl a part of the tunnel to experience the real life of the Vietnamese guerrillas, who used to use and live inside this system during the wartime. Return to Saigon with stop en route for lunch at local restaurant.

Afternoon, visit the  Reunification Palace, the Notre Dame Cathedral and Post Office will give us more knowledge of the old time of the city. Continue to the bustling China Town with “Cho Lon” (Big market) and Thien Hau Temple of the Chinese community to enjoy daily life of the working people of Saigon nowadays. Overnight in Saigon

In the morning, we will be free at leisure for relaxation or shopping until noon. Say good bye to Saigon and board our luxurious vessel, RVLa Marguerite, from Saigon. Have look around the cruise and get a short brief of facilities and amenities of the cruise Enjoy your time and the first dinner on board with piano performance on Saigon lounge from 21.00 to 23.00. Overnight on board.

After breakfast, we will have a short description of the life on the Mekong river. Relax and have an excursion to floating market Cai Be. Join the trading activities of the peasants of the Mekong Delta, who travel to the market on the boats full of fruits and farming products. Visit family factories and orchards to taste some juicy tropical fruits. Meet the local people in their charming old-styled houses or garden houses. Return to the boat at the end of the afternoon, enjoy the Mekong folk dance and have dinner on board.

The tour guide will take us to the nice town Sadec, where Marguerite Duras, the writer of famous novel “The Lover“ (L’amant) inhabited. Visit the ancient house of Mr. Huynh Thuy Le, known as The Lover’s Museum. We will also pass by the school where Marguerite's mother was a teacher, and view her home from across the river. Stop at local markets along the river and visit an ancient pagoda and a Chinese temple. At noontime we will cruise to Tan Chau and have our lunch served on board. Enjoy the peaceful landscape of local villages. Dinner and overnight on board

The matrix of narrow tributaries and arroyos are not available for the main cruise so we will take small boat to visit fish farms, where fish are bred in cages suspended under floating houses on the Mekong River. Go ashore and have a short excursion by cyclo with stops at local factories making traditional silk, rattan mats and slippers. At noontime we will return to the cruise and have lunch during the time for immigration formalities at Vietnam/Cambodia border. Enjoy the first night in Cambodia with great dinner and cocktails after a short seminar session on “Indochina - The Past and Present.” Overnight on board.

We will get off the cruise to have a full day in Phnompenh city today, starting at the National Fine-Arts Museum, a great museum not just of Cambodia but Southeast Asia, and Wat Phnom, the pagoda, from which the city gets its current name. Continue to the Silver pagoda, Royal palace and Central Market or Orussey Market. Back to the cruise to have lunch before heading to the Killing Field and Tuol Sleng (S21) Museum to learn more about a horrible part of the Khme nation’s history. Back to the cruise for dinner with Khme musical performance and overnight while our cruise heads to Kampong Cham.

Today we will explore Wat Wat Hanchey, a pagoda on the top of the hill with panorama of the Mekong river. Return to the boat and cast off for Kampong Cham - the garden city. Exlopre Kampong Cham’s rubber farms, factories and the farms and forests of timbers, Ceylon ironwood, rosewood, bean trees and teak. Visit the 12thcentury Angkorian temple of Wat Nokor and Cheung Kok Eco village. Dinner and overnight on board while the cruise continue heading to Kampong Chhnang.

Full day relax and enjoy the river life of local people in Tonle Lake with visits villages with floating houses, floating schools, floating hospitals or even floating pig and chicken farms. Life of local people entirely relies on the sources of Tonle Lake with fishing, rice cultivation by “natural“ fertilizer. In the afternoon we will reach the largest part of the Lake with the distance between two banks around 30km. Enjoy a tranquil night time in the Lake with farewell dinner and drinks. 

The last day of cruising will be ended soon by transfer by motorboats to the local jetty, approximately 5 to 6km away from the cruise. Take our bus to hotel for check-in. In the afternoon we will have a half-day city tour to the ancient citadel of Angkor Thom, which is 7km from Siemreap, including the temples of Bayon, Baphuan, Elephant Terrace and the Terrace of the Leper King. View the sunset over Angkor complex on the top of Phnom Bakheng mountain. Dinner enjoying Apsara traditional dance. Overnight in Siemreap. (Lunch at your own arrangement for flexibility).

After breakfast, visit the Ta Prohm temple, a wonderful combination of human construction genius and natural beauty of giant trees, which have grown for centuries. Go on to visit Ta Keo, dedicated to the Hindu God Shiva and was built at the end of 10th century. Visit the temples of Thommanon, Chau Say Tevoda and the natural lake of Sra Srang. Have Lunch before visit Angkor Wat. The founder was Suryavarman II who reigned Cambodia from 1113 to 1152 had built the five towers of the Wat in 12th century to dedicate them to the Hindu God Vishnu. The plan of the pyramidal conception of the temple, combined with spaces, alleys, ditches, is an ancient masterpiece of Khmer design and construction. Back to Siemreap for overnight. (Dinner at your own arrangement).

After breakfast, spend the entire morning in one of the jewels of Angkor, the Banteay Srey Temple, which means "Citadel of Women", made of pink sandstone and presents the most graceful bas-relieves in stone we might ever seen in our life. After a picnic lunch near the site, we will head to Kbal Spean, “the river of thousand Lingas”, the phallic symbol of the God Shiva. Upon arrival near the site, we will go for a walk for an hour through the forest until arrive at Kbal Spean. Return to Siemreap for our last night in Cambodia. (Dinner at your own arrangement).

After breakfast, have your own time until being transferred to the airport for your departure flight.