Vietnam, Cambodia, and S. Korea

[turbo]

So I pulled the trigger this week on an almost three-week trip to SE Asia - specifically Vietnam with a three-day trip into Cambodia - and we have a few days in S. Korea on the way home.

Any advice for things we can’t miss in the area? Traveling with our two kids (7 and 5), so things that are appealing to them are especially great. We’re doing Hanoi, HCMC, and Hoi An in Vietnam. We have a travel agent but they don’t seem to have many kid-specific recs.

Also we have almost two full days in S. Korea on the way back and that’s independent without any agent, so would love suggestions for things to do there. I imagine we will stick to Seoul and it’s immediate environs but can be convinced to do a day trip somewhere if it’s really better than just exploring the city.

[keweenawlove]

Fun! I'd love to hear a report afterwards on how it went with kids. H and I went in 2017 but without kids. A Ha Long bay cruise could be fun. There were some families with kids on the one we were on.

The beaches near Hoi An were super nice so that could be a nice break for the kids. It was crazy hot when we were there. Not kid-centric but I wish I had saved more packing space to have clothes there. I ended up getting a full suit and some dresses and I've been wishing there was an easy way to get more since then!

[origami]

We used to live in S Korea. My kids were 6yo when we went to Vietnam & Cambodia. Highlights below. I have the full itinerary from our travel agent (Audley), if you want more details.

HCMC
- Cu Chi tunnels + tour of the main sights (re-unification palace, china town, cholon market, war museum). Kids liked the tunnels & market, not so much the rest
- Bassac Boat overnight cruise on Mekong delta. Each parent had to take a kid for the night and split up b/c the rooms were only for 2 ppl. 

Hanoi
- Tour of main sights: Ho Chi Min's mausoleum, temple of literature, old quarter
- Paper mask making in the Old quarter (this was in a person's house, which I found interesting. it was a pain to get to in a taxi b/c of the traffic but the kids had fun)
- Water puppet performance in the evening

Halong bay cruise

Siem Reap
(I had horrific food poisoning that I probably got from eating airline food on the flight there. I essentially missed 2 days here but still sharing what DH did with the kids)
- Angkor Wat
- We were supposed to see Pre-Rup at sunrise but H skipped it when I was sick
- Ta Prohm
- Tuk Tuk ride to Angkor Thom & Bayon temple
- Circus (acrobats) 
- Boat cruise on Tonle Sap Lake

Hoi An
(We did this separately)
- Marble Mountain
- Walked around the ancient part of Hoi An and did one of those little water boat rides
- We had plans to go to My Khe beach but it was unseasonably cold so we skipped

Seoul
They have tons of kid-friendly things to do.
- Amusement parks like Lotte World or Seoul Land
- Zoos like Seoul Grand Park and Children's grand park
- random kids cafes located throughout the city (ask your hotel for up to date recs b/c these come and go constantly)
- dress up in hanbok and walk around Gyeongbokgung palace. When we lived there I took visitors on a 1 day tour of the palace, Insadong, Bukchon (where some old homes & picturesque photo spots are) and the cheonggyecheon stream. it's a ton of walking but those are the biggie sites downtown and they're fairly close to one another 
- If you're at all into K Beauty, go to Myeongdong for all the shopping. It's a fun lively area for kids too and it has markets nearby they might like if they enjoy putzing around those. Myeongdong also has animal cafes and a Hello Kitty cafe
- Seoul has a space needle type thing. It's a tourist trap but the kids might still like it
- War Museum is good but obviously more of an adult thing
- kukkiwon tae kwon do performances are pretty cool if your kids are into that

[chicago]

Would love to know more about your itinerary! I am thinking about Vietnam and Cambodia for December 2024 with our kids, who will be 7 and 10.

[turbo]

origami , that was insanely helpful - thank you! Especially for Seoul because we have no plans / recommendations for there. 

Is the circus Phare? If so, we have seats for that reserved and I'm looking forward to it. Sorry to hear you got food poisoning - I had wicked bad food poisoning in Myanmar several years ago, and it's just... so much worse when you're not able to enjoy the comforts of your own home. I puked over the side of our hot air balloon tour through Bagan. 

[turbo]

Oct 9, 2023 14:10:04 GMT -5 chicago said:

Would love to know more about your itinerary! I am thinking about Vietnam and Cambodia for December 2024 with our kids, who will be 7 and 10.

Happy to share! Our itinerary is as follows:

4 nights Hanoi (we fly into Hanoi from the US, connecting in S. Korea)
2 nights cruising Lan Ha Bay (apparently the less touristy version of Halong Bay, right next door)
3 nights in Siem Reap 
3 nights in HCMC
4 nights in Hoi An 

We've got a bunch of fun stuff booked - in Hanoi, we're going to tour the city, go to Ninh Binh, visit one of the national parks near Hanoi (TBD which one - one has a bear rescue, another has an endangered marsupial or something... so have to figure out the right one), and then I guess there's a section of Hanoi that closes down the streets all weekend and becomes like a community walking area with games, activities, etc., so we will check that out. Then in Lan Ha Bay we get to explore Cat Ba National park, visit a small village, try fishing for squid, swim in the water, lounge on the beach, etc. In Siem Reap we want to see Phare (the circus / cirque-like show), visit Angkor Wat, check out some other temples, do a morning meditation and alms giving with monks, and then we spend an afternoon in the countryside - you take a boat there, then have a bunch of activities you can do (like riding in an ox cart, getting a foot massage, painting coconuts, etc.) before you have an al fresco dinner at the villa there. We're also going to visit the Cambodian Land Mine Rats nonprofit, where you can meet the rats that are sniffing out landmines. If time permits, we'll stop at a children's hospital. Then in HCMC we have a bit of time to explore the city and spend one day touring the Cu Chi tunnels and one exploring the Mekong Delta on a private boat. In the evening one night we will do a vespa tour to sample various street food. We finish up with four nights at a beach resort outside of Hoi An, where we will do a walking tour of the city, have a cultural experience out in the countryside (where the kids can ride a water buffalo and stuff), and we have a boat charter one day to take us out to the Cham Islands for snorkeling / beach time. The hotel also has a beach and we have a villa there with a private pool so the kids will probably swim a lot. Then we fly back to S. Korea, have two nights there, and then fly on home. 

[majesty318]

Hanoi Kids tour in Hanoi - free tours run by students learning English. I did a street food tour with them, this was a while ago now, but it was awesome. We just had to pay for the food.

hanoikids.org/

[Waytob]

Hey - lived in Vietnam for a year and visit it often.

The Vespa food tour in Hanoi or Hoi An is really good and kid friendly. Are you doing HCM first then coming back to Hoi An? Seems counter intuitive unless you are flying onwards from Hanoi. My Khee beach in Danang is lovely and also very child friendly - hours drive from Hoi An - make sure you eat some Cau Lau and the bread in Hoi An - best in Vietnam

Lan Ha Bay - just check with the boat that they don't offload you onto a smaller boat for day 2 - what happens often is those on the 1 night cruise are taken back the following day and those on 2 nights are moved to a smaller boat - with kids this means you need to carry anything you will need for the day

Happy to answer any specifics you may have on Vietnam (including things like SIM cards etc) - really recommend you download the Grab App - food delivery in a pinch as well as quick way to get around

[origami]

Oct 9, 2023 21:38:12 GMT -5 turbo said:

origami , that was insanely helpful - thank you! Especially for Seoul because we have no plans / recommendations for there. 

Is the circus Phare? If so, we have seats for that reserved and I'm looking forward to it. Sorry to hear you got food poisoning - I had wicked bad food poisoning in Myanmar several years ago, and it's just... so much worse when you're not able to enjoy the comforts of your own home. I puked over the side of our hot air balloon tour through Bagan. 

yes Phare! I couldn’t remember the name but that’s it. Sorry to hear you also had a bad food poisoning experience

[turbo]

Waytob, thank you! I’ll add the beach to my list and I’m glad to hear the Vespa tour is child-friendly because I wanted to do it but was a bit anxious about putting the kids on the back of a Vespa.

Our itinerary is Hanoi - Siem Reap - HCMC - Hoi An, mainly because of the way international flights worked out for us. I wanted to minimize connections and couldn’t fly into Siem Reap directly from S. Korea. So, we had to start in either Hanoi or HCMC, and tickets were $2K less a piece when we flew into Hanoi so… that won out. (Also airline ticket pricing is so arbitrary and stupid.) We finish in Hoi An because that’s where we are splurging the most on a nice beach hotel, so figured I’d save that for the end of the trip so that there was no disappointment from everyone when we moved on after staying there. Definitely a little different for routing than I would have done otherwise, but it was tricky working flights and I wanted to be cost-conscious where I could. We almost skipped HCMC entirely because my kids are just not city travelers, but I ultimately decided I think they’ll enjoy the stuff there enough that it’s worth the visit. We’ve got a day tour to the Cu Chi tunnels and a boat trip up the Mekong for our two days there, plus the Vespa food your and a hotel with a pool and I’ll be prepared for some whining.

Will double check the boat! I’m pretty sure ours is two nights on the same boat and everyone books it as a two-night cruise but good to know I need to confirm that. Also will download the Grab app as feeding my kids while traveling is a special level of hell I wouldn’t wish on anyone, so being able to get food quickly is going to be a godsend. Thank you!

[origami]

turbo my kids food pickiness was also next level. They wouldn’t even eat rice for the longest time. So living in Asia was… something.

Anyway, I’d encourage you to request food modifications in advance for the boat cruises. I asked them for their menu a few weeks early and based on that asked them to make plain chicken satays for the kids and they did. Otherwise they’d have lived off applesauce pouches bc not 1 thing on there was something they were ok with. On land we sometimes fed the kids early at McDs or BK and then the adults ate local stuff but that’s not always convenient when fast food isn’t near you. Hopefully there’s some kind of twist on local foods your kids will eat. I found restaurants there to be very accommodating of kids (when possible). Far more accommodating than American restaurants - maybe bc they’re making more from scratch. But they can only work with the ingredients they have of course.

[origami]

The above app rec reminded me of another Korea thing. You may already know this but google maps doesn’t give walking directions there. You can look up restaurants and other places but you’ll have to get a Korean map app to get there - KakaoMap or NaverMap are the biggies that have an English version. You’ll also need a Korean app to call taxis

We told our kids that Korean bbq was “chicken bacon” (because they ate both of those foods) and they believed it. Korean bbq is a million times better in seoul than in my US state and I’m jealous you may get to eat it lol. Fried chicken in Korea is spicy just FYI. You can’t rely on restaurants in seoul to have an English speaking person but in the tourist spots English menus might be available. No one will expect you to speak Korean but they often can’t accommodate special requests because of the way they prep/cook food. Seoul was definitely more of a “feed the kids separately” type of place for us. Except for bbq

ETA: the people of Seoul looooooooooove kids. People would leap out of their subway seats so my kids could sit down. Strangers would give them money, candy, hair pats (because they had curly hair) and take pics of them. When I got lost, ppl would walk us to our destination. It was by far the most family friendly city I’ve ever been to