Wanderlust Tips Team, Author at WANDERLUST TIPS • Page 147 of 197

The 13th edition of International Travel Expo Ho Chi Minh City

ITE HCMC 2017, themed ‘Your Gateway to Tourism in Asia’, continues to be one of the most important and established international travel events in Vietnam and the region, further promoting Vietnam’s tourism and enhancing the development of the tourism industry regionally and globally.

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The International Travel Expo, Ho Chi Minh City (ITE HCMC) 2017, returns for the 13th time as the largest and most established annual international travel trade event in the Mekong sub-region. ITE HCMC 2017 continues to grow from strength to strength on the scale of the expo and the quality of participants, delivering the hospitality of Vietnam’s destinations and Ho Chi Minh City.

Endorsed by the Ministry of Culture, Sports & Tourism, Vietnam, and the Ho Chi Minh City People’s Committee, the 13th ITE HCMC will be held from 7th to 9th September at the Saigon Exhibition & Convention Centre (SECC), Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. Organised by the Vietnam National Administration of Tourism (VNAT); Ho Chi Minh City Department of Tourism; Informa Exhibitions Pte Ltd; and the Vietnam Trade Fair & Advertising Joint Stock (VINEXAD), ITE HCMC 2017, themed ‘Your Gateway to Tourism in Asia’, provides a platform for the international and local travel businesses to keep up with the travel trends, get updated on tourism products and services, establish connections with new business partners, further boosting the tourism potential of the country and the ASEAN region.

Mr Bui Ta Hoang Vu, Director of the Ho Chi Minh City Department of Tourism, and Chairman of the Organising Committee, says: “ITE HCMC 2017, themed ‘Your Gateway to Tourism in Asia’, is celebrated with the 50th Anniversary of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). ASEAN is a highly integrated and dynamic political – economic organisation, enhancing connectivity and cooperation among the country members in all sectors, and tourism is one of the most important areas of cooperation.”

Delivering products that enhance the tourism competitiveness of Vietnam and Ho Chi Minh City is at the heart of ITE HCMC this year. With that in mind, the ITE HCMC Organising Committee has dedicated to improving the quality and content of event, bringing new and exciting activities for the participants, some of which including exclusive buyer-seller online pre-appointment system, a destination visitor survey programme, specialised international seminars, Travel Fun Fair Day, special travel discounts and promotions, and other cultural musical performances, catering not only for the international and regional buyers, sellers, travel trade experts and media partners but also the public. These wide range of activities are customised to keep the event attendees updated with the current news and trends of the Travel & Tourism industry.

INCREASED ACTIVE PARTICIPATION FROM INTERNATIONAL AND LOCAL MARKETS – AN EFFECTIVE INTERNATIONAL MARKETING CHANNEL

With a plan to create more opportunities for international and local businesses to promote their tourism products and bring the businesses together, the ITE HCMC 2017 Organising Committee has invested to expand the total area of exhibitions of scale, with an increase of 15 per cent as compared to 2016, for the 300 exhibition booths. The expo attracts a wide range of international and local travel companies from 25 countries.

This year sees the strong continued participation of international promotion agencies such as the Indian Tourism; Japan National Tourism Organization (JNTO); Korea Tourism Organization (KTO); Kyushu Tourism Promotion Organization (KTPO); Ministry of Information, Culture and Tourism, Lao PDR; Ministry of Tourism of Cambodia; Penang Global Tourism (PGT); Taiwan Tourism; Tokyo Convention & Visitors Bureau (TCVB); Tourism Authority of Thailand; Tourism Promotion Organization for Asia Pacific Cities (TPO); Turkish Embassy Tourism and Information Office; the Union of Myanmar Travel Association (UMTA); and the Wuhan Tourism Development & Investment Group Swan International Travel Service (China).

ITE HCMC this year also attracts a number of international tourism enterprises seeking business and cooperation opportunities in the Vietnamese market such as the Tour Diamond Company – Myanmar, Prince Hotel – Japan, Traveltek Travel Company – Australia, Plumeria Resort – Maldives, Kansai Airports – Japan, Aeroflot Russia Airlines – Russia, Resorts World Sentosa – Singapore, Daegu – Korea, and Japan Excellent Health Organization – Japan.

Not only the international tourism promotion agencies and businesses will participate in this year’s event, ITE HCMC 2017 also attracts hundreds of travel companies, large resort hotels, as well as small and medium enterprises from Ho Chi Minh City and other 30 provinces and cities in the country.

HIGH PRIORITY ON THE ANNUAL HOSTED BUYERS & MEDIA PROGRAMME

Across the region, ITE HCMC also serves as an international travel hub where professionals network and conduct businesses. The annual Hosted Buyers and Hosted Media Programmes are the two areas of the most importance at ITE HCMC, again highlighting and reaffirming ITE HCMC as the prime international trade travel event for regional and international businesses.

ITE HCMC 2017 has attracted professionals and representatives from more than 700 international travel companies. The Organising Committee and Advisory Board of the Hosted Buyers Programme have invited up to 300 international buyers from 40 countries and territories, especially from the key markets of Vietnam such as the U.S., the U.K., France, Italy, Germany, China, Japan, ASEAN, India, Taiwan, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, and some other new markets such as Iran, Iraq, South Africa, and Nepal.

Alongside the Hosted Buyer Programme, the event will also host 40 international media from prominent travel, lifestyle, tourism, and broadcast platforms, as well as award-winning travel bloggers and digital influencers with a strong following on social media from the U.K., France, the Netherlands, Germany, Hong Kong, India, New Zealand, Thailand, Taiwan, the U.S., Korea, China, Australia, the U.A.E, Turkey, Singapore, Norway, Japan and the Philippines.

The hosted buyers and media will be engaged in the Destination Visitor Survey Programme to different major travel destinations in Ho Chi Minh City such as Can Gio, Mekong – Delta – Can Tho, Da Lat – Ninh Thuan, Phan Thiet – Binh Thuan, Phu Yen and Ha Long. The hosted buyers and media will also attend the exclusive Tourism Promotion Exhibition Programme and Seminars on Introducing Key and Potential Travel Destinations in 2017, and on Developing MICE Tourism in Ho Chi Minh City, presented by leading international speakers. These customised programmes are designed to provide a unique networking and insights exchanging platform for domestic and international businesses.

EVENT DETAILS & PRE-REGISTRATION
♦ Dates &Time:
7th September (Trade Visitors): 8am – 5pm
8th September (Trade Visitors): 9am – 5pm
9th September (Public & Visitors): 9am – 5pm
♦ Venue: Saigon Exhibition & Convention Centre (SECC)

Wanderlust Tips | Cinet

Vermicelli dishes in Hanoi: Full of beef with only VND25,000

If you are still wondering what to eat today, why not try a bowl of vermicelli with beef stewed in red wine?

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Hanoi has a very diverse food culture from the traditional dishes which have been well-known long time ago, to the local dishes from all over the country to come here, and some new receipts people create themselves like the vermicelli with beef stewed in red wine. There is such a dish, strange from the name to the taste.

If the bread with beef stewed in red wine is too familiar to many people living in Hanoi, this vermicelli with beef stewed in red wine seems to be quite new. Kham Thien is one of the rare places in Hanoi selling this dish.The restaurant is located at the beginning of the alley on Kham Thien Street. Every morning, the little alley is so crowded when the visitors come to enjoy this dish.

According to Mrs. Lan the owner, 15 years ago, she only sold Vietnamese rice vermicelli with crab paste soup and rice pancake soup. Just five years ago, she came up with this dish. Actually, the restaurant also has many other dishes such as beef noodle, beef vermicelli. But somehow, most of people coming here love to eat vermicelli with beef stewed in red wine.

Besides usual vermicelli, thin sliced beef, a bowl of vermicelli with beef stewed in red wine here also has beef stewed in red wine.

When you do not know what to eat this morning, “bun bo sot vang” will be a good choice for you. Moreover, for a price of only VND25,000 for a breakfast is so suitable for those who love delicious – nutrient – cheap food.
One more thing that one can not forget about this small noodle stall is its good and kind owner – Mrs.Lan.

Address: Cong Trang Lane, Kham Thien Sreet, Hanoi
Price: VND25,000
Open time: 5:30am – 10am

Wanderlust Tips | Cinet

First 12 open-top double-decker buses inaugurated in Da Nang

The first batch of 12 open-top double-decker buses has started service at Coco Bay entertainment-cum-hospitality complex in the central coastal city of Da Nang.

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Each decker has 54 seats, with 12 seats on the lower deck and 42 seats on the upper deck.

The service, called Coco Bus Tour, has two routes with the first departing from Da Nang airport to the south of the city with 25 stops, while the second route will be put into operation in September 2017 to the north of the hub, from the airport to Son Tra peninsula with about 18 stops.

There are 30 open-top bus services a day, with an interval of 30 minutes between 07h00 and 22h00. The listed price is VND250,000 (about USD10.98) which can be used for either route within 24 hours and allows passengers to hop off and hop on at any stop.

The tour will run free of charge until the end of August 2017, and will offer a 50% discount from September to November 2017. The project was jointly developed by Empire Group and local car maker Truong Hai. Earlier, in July 2017, the two businesses tested the operation of the 12 buses to serve tourism in the city.

Vietnamtourism | Wanderlust Tips | Cinet

Ha Long Bay was listed among top 50 natural wonders of the world

Ha Long Bay has been listed among top 50 natural wonders in the world by CNN Travel.

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According to CNN’s Travel, Ha Long Bay, Quang Ninh Province, Vietnam has thousands of small islands and standing stacks, or karsts, overgrown with green shrubbery, protrude from Halong Bay, a peaceful bay.

The popular way to explore is in a traditional Chinese trading ship — the brown-paneled sails of the junks have become as much a part of the landscape as the towering rocks.

Most visitors to Halong Bay come via Hanoi — 170 kilometers away, or five to six hours on a public bus. Private cars can be hired. Even rented helicopters make the journey.

Some of other places in the list include Pulpit Rock, Preikestolen, Norway; Gran Salar de Uyuni, Bolivia; Ngorogoro Crater, Tanzania; Paria Canyon, Arizona, United States; Volcanic eruptions at Stromboli, Italy; Mud volcanoes of Gobustan, Azerbaijan; Jeita Grotto, Nahr al-Kalb Valley, Lebanon; Pembrokeshire Coast Path National Trail, Wales; Pangong Tso Lake, India-China.

PULPIT ROCK, PREIKESTOLEN, NORWAY

With a 604-meter drop from a flat plateau down to Lysefjord with no safety railings, this is not a place for vertigo sufferers.

Keep well back from the edge and you can still enjoy the fantastic scenery over Kjerag peak, which itself drops 984 meters.

Preikestolen is south of Jorpeland. From the designated car park it’s a 90-minute hike to the viewpoint.

GRAN SALAR DE UYUNI, BOLIVIA

The Gran Salar de Uyuni in southern Bolivia takes in more than 10 square kilometers of salt. It feels more like a desert than a lake.

The flat, white landscape causes optical illusions and reflects colors. There’s even a hotel made almost entirely of salt and an island where giant cacti grow in the middle of the salt lake.

Gran Salar de Uyuni is 533 kilometers south of La Paz and 200 kilometers southwest of Potosi.

GOROGORO CRATER, TANZANIA

The Ngorogoro Crater is Africa’s Eden. Created when a huge volcano exploded 2-3 million years ago, the 300 square kilometer caldera now offers the best chances of seeing Africa’s wild animals.

Lions, rhino, leopards, elephant and buffalo are the “big five” present among around 25,000 animals, and nearly every species present in East Africa, which call the area home.

Besides that, the crater itself offers dramatic vistas, especially at sunrise.

From Kilimanjaro International Airport you can fly or drive the 55 kilometers to Arusha, from where you can organize tours and accommodation inside and outside the crater.

PARIA CANYNON, ARIZONA, UNITED STATES

The Paria River in northern Arizona carved its own smaller version of the Grand Canyon. Some of the rock formations, including The Wave, are just as spectacular.

Visitors need a permit from the Bureau of Land Management — the permit for an overnight trek comes with a “human waste bag,” so if you want to visit this natural wonder, you’ll have to prepare to pack your waste.

The Paria Contact Station is 69 kilometers east of Kanab. You can hire a guide through the Bureau of Land Management.

VOLCANIC ERUPTIONS AT STROMBOLI, ITALY

Part of the Aeolian Islands off the coast of Sicily, Stromboli is a small volcanic island with several hundred brave inhabitants.

Unlike most volcanoes, Stromboli’s is constantly spewing lava fountains, gas and ash. Fascinating for volcanologists, but also great for day-trippers who fancy seeing live lava action.

For natural fireworks, take a boat trip around the island at night. Arrange boat tours from harbors on the north coast of Sicily (Messina, Cefalu, Palermo).

MUD VOLCANOES OF GOBUSTAN, AZERBAIJAN

Mud lovers trek to Gobustan’s strangely Martian landscape, 65 kilometers south of Azerbaijan’s capital Baku, where thick gray mud regularly spews from small volcanoes.

The mud is thought to have medicinal qualities, so don’t be surprised if you see people stripping down and lathering themselves in the goo. Look out for the area’s Roman inscriptions and the petroglyphic rock art.
About 70 kilometers west of Baku.

JEITA GROTTO, NAHR AL-KALB, LEBANON

Eighteen kilometers northeast of Beirut, Jeita Grotto is comprised of underground limestone caves were inhabited in prehistoric times and continue to attract human visitors with their vivid colors and stalactite formations. The biggest stalactite in the world is here.

The caves consist of a network of chambers — with an upper and a lower gallery — stretching out for nine kilometers and accessible by an underground river.

The nearest town is Juniyah, just a few kilometers away. Cave tours last two hours.

PEMBROKESSHIRE COAST PATH NATIONAL TRAIL, WALES

This path twists 300 kilometers from St. Dogmaels to Amroth in southwest Wales. It’s often wet and windy, but if you strike lucky on a sunny day this is one of the most beautiful places on earth. Scented gorse and crimson heather brighten the way.

Paths are signposted — join the path on the coast between St. Dogmaels and Amroth. Details on guided walks and activities can be found on the National Trails website — including self-guided walks with baggage transfer.

PANGONG TSO LAKE, INDIA-CHINA

This saltwater lake deep in the Himalayas at an altitude of 4,350 meters lies astride a disputed border area between India and China-governed Tibet.

Don’t let that put you off — the rarefied air make the colors and clarity of the lake intense.
Pangong Tso is reached by a mountain road from the Indian town of Leh, but you’ll need to get a permit via a registered tour guide.

Get to Leh by road from Jammu, or by plane from Delhi. At Leh arrange a permit and travel by road 4-5 hours to the lake. Permits and tour guides can be arranged through reputable travel agents such as Kuoni.

Wanderlust Tips | Cinet

Life in the Mekong, Can Tho 20 years ago

The peaceful and colourful life of simple and sincere people in Cantho was captured by the photographer Harry Gruyaert in 1994.

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Harry Gruyaert is a Belgian photographer born in 1941. He studied Film and Photography from 1959 to 1962. He spent time working as a freelance photographer in Paris, then working for the famous photo magazine named Magnum.

In 1994, he visited Vietnam and recorded the ordinary moments of people in the Can Tho River. In the picture, there was a girl rowing on the Hau river. The photographer said he was fascinated by the living of sincere workers in the land. His pictures reflect Can Tho people‘s lives in 1994.

Wanderlust Tips | Cinet

Golden waves on the terraces in Mu Cang Chai

There will be many exciting activities during Culture Tourism Week and National Landscape Festival 2017 for discovering Mu Cang Chai’s terraces.

Tam Thanh Art Village won the Asian prize

Tam Thanh community art village in Tam Ky City, Quang Nam Province has been awarded the 2017 Asian Townscape Award.

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Tam Thanh Art Village was officially inaugurated in June 2017 on the occasion of Quang Nam heritage festival 2017. It hosts around 500 visitors each day, and 2,000 tourists on weekends.

The Asian Townscape Award, designed by UN-Habitat, Asian Habitat Society, Asian Townscape Design Society and Fukuoka Asian Urban Research Centre, aims to honour cities, regions and projects which made significant contribution to building landscapes which support satisfying and sufficient living environments for Asian people. In 2017, the prize honours 15 cities, including four cities in China, three in the Republic of Korea, four in Japan and four in Southeast Asia. The ceremony will be held in Yinchuan city on September 28th-29th.

The village was shaped to seek sustainable solutions to improve the living environment and create livelihoods for local residents on the basis of the core values of the locality. It has a 6km coastline and a tranquil environment, and from the village tourists can easily access Tam Ky and Hoi An cities. In 2013, Hoi An historic town centre was chosen for the 2013 Townscape Award by the UN-Habitat Regional Office in Asia.

Vietnamtourism | Wanderlust Tips | Cinet

The Best Cocktails in the World

Colin Field, head bartender at the Ritz Paris’s Bar Hemingway, and Damon Boelte, head bartender and co-owner of Grand Army in Brooklyn, help us trace the history of a handful of classic cocktails—like the Bronx and the Manhattan above—that put their namesake on the map.

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1. THE BRONX AND THE MANHATTAN

The Bronx…

In the early 1900s, the Waldorf-Astoria’s bartender Johnnie Solon enhanced the traditional martini’s orange bitters with a splash of orange juice. The name is said to have come from Solon’s visit to the newly opened Bronx Zoo, whose wild creatures reminded him of some of his own patrons after too much drink. The Bronx, which once rivaled the Manhattan, was made popular, according to Field, by legendary barman Frank Meier, who started at the Hoffman House Hotel on Broadway and 25th, later ending up at Paris’s Bar Hemingway.

2 oz. Gin
1/2 oz. Sweet vermouth
1/2 oz. Blanc vermouth
1 oz. Freshly squeezed orange juice
Serve up.

…And the Manhattan

The drink is reputed to have been created in New York for American socialite Jennie Jerome, a.k.a. Winston Churchill’s mother, for a party she supposedly threw at the Manhattan Club in honor of Samuel Tilden’s gubernatorial election in 1874. But according to Field, “she was about to give birth to the future prime minister, so she couldn’t have been in the club.” More likely is that it was invented by a bartender there, “for, but not in the presence of, Jerome,” Field says.

2 oz. Rye whiskey
1/2 oz. Sweet vermouth
1/2 oz. Blanc vermouth
3 Dashes of bitters
Serve up, stirred.

2. THE JAPANESE COCKTAIL

“It’s a brandy old-fashioned of sorts,” says Damon Boelte of one of the first cocktails in the 1862 edition of Jerry Thomas’s How to Mix Drinks to be listed by name rather than by ingredients. Though the drink dates from the1860 Japanese diplomatic mission to the United States and is thought to have been inspired by the representatives who lived near and drank at Thomas’s bar in downtown Manhattan, there is nothing even remotely Japanese about the ingredients. The moniker, however, presages the ebb and flow of America’s fascination with Japanese culture in subsequent years.

2 1/2 oz. Louis Royer Cognac (106 proof)
1/2 oz. Orgeat
3 Dashes of bitters
Serve up with a twist of orange.

3. QUEEN’S PARK SWIZZLE

It’s no wonder that this mojito-like cocktail, which originated in Port- of-Spain’s now-defunct Queen’s Park Hotel, was invented in the 1920s. That was the height of Prohibition and Trinidad’s heyday as an upscale winter escape—a moment when Americans would travel far and wide to booze liberally.

8–12 Muddled mint leaves
2 oz. Aged gold rum (the higher the proof, the better)
3/4 oz. Lime juice
3/4 oz. Simple syrup
Pour over mint and ice and swizzle; serve with several dashes of bitters.

4. SINGAPORE SLING

“A very beautiful example of how a bartender or a bar can become the lighthouse of a hotel,” says Bar Hemingway’s Colin Field of the iconic mixture invented in 1915 by Ngiam Tong Boon, the Hainanese-born barman at the Raffles Hotel in Singapore. The drink is so popular at the property’s Long Bar that the staff makes some 1,200 of them a day.

1 1/2 oz. Gin
1 oz. Orange juice
3/4 oz. Lemon juice
1 oz. Curaçao
1/4 oz. Benedictine
A splash of seltzer
A drizzle of Cherry Heering
Shake and serve over ice.

5. THE FRISCO

The origins of the drink have, unfortunately, been lost to time. “All I can say about the Frisco is that I love whiskey, I love Benedictine, and I love that town,” Boelte says. It is often served as a sour (with lemon juice) and shaken.
1 1/2 oz. Rye whiskey
1 1/ 2 oz. Benedictine
A dash of bitters
Stir and serve up with a peel of orange or lemon.

6. THE ETNA SPRITZ

So called for the unobstructed view of Mount Etna from the seaside terrace of the Belmond Grand Hotel Timeo in Taormina, the cocktail is bar manager Alfio Liotta’s decidedly Sicilian riff on the Aperol Spritz.

1 1/2 oz. Campari
1 1/2 oz. Sicilian orange liqueur
1 1/2 oz. Sicilian sparkling wine
A splash of soda
Stir with ice; garnish with a slice of Sicilian orange and its zest.

7. THE FRENCH 75

Named after the 75-millimeter field artillery cannon used during the First World War, the original French 75 was created in Paris in 1915 by “a chap called Henry of Henry’s Bar,” Field says, at a now-shuttered hotel by the same name. As with cocktails themselves, which, he adds, were “invented by Brits but made famous by Americans,” it was the Stork Club in New York that popularized the drink.
1 1/2 oz. Gin
3/4 oz. Lemon juice
1/2 oz. Simple syrup
Shake with ice and top with Champagne and a lemon twist.

Cntraveler | Wanderlust Tips | Cinet

Different views of foreigners when visiting Vietnam

A 32-year-old girl originally named Kate from the Boston, New York summarized from so many posts on two sides of the argument about Vietnam. Just take a look to know what foreign travelers think about Vietnam.

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WHAT WOMEN SAY ABOUT VIETNAM

To get more opinions, Kate reached out to her female blogger friends who have been to Vietnam. Most of them had a complicated view of the country as a whole, alternatively enjoying and not enjoying it. As she read piece after piece, common themes began to emerge.

The experience of traveling Vietnam, though difficult at times, is overall a net positive. Steph from Twenty-Something Travel eloquently described how Vietnam was difficult to travel at times, but ultimately a wonderful, rewarding destination. And for a different side of Vietnam, Lash from Lash World Tour visited the northwest highlands of Vietnam and its Hmong villages and found that even this ethnically different region of Vietnam was as beautiful and challenging as the rest. Scams abound — primarily (though not exclusively) in the north. But they’re not bad enough to write off the entire country.

Bethaney from Flashpacker Family had a very rough time in Vietnam the first time around — but on her second visit, she grew to love the country. She also gives tips for Vietnam travelers. While Lillie from Around the World L had a bad experience when she was groped by her motorbike driver out in the middle of nowhere, she shrugged it off as an isolated incident and loved the rest of the country.

The food is exceptional. While the food of Southeast Asia gets almost universal acclaim, Vietnamese food is on another level. Jodi from Legal Nomads just settled into Saigon for a three month stay. She’s fascinated by Vietnam so far and in love with the food culture.

Getting to know the people of Vietnam is the single most rewarding thing you can do.

Aleah of Solitary Wanderer spent awhile in Saigon and enjoyed it thoroughly — it felt like home to her then, and still does now. Her fondest memories are of the people she met. Kate from 30 Traveler was lucky enough to be invited to a Vietnamese wedding! She described the kindness of the people she met in Vietnam here. Vietnam is an enormously important country to visit for its cultural and historical context.

According to Lillie from Around the World L, “My month in Vietnam was half wonderful and half super-stressful. It’s important for people to visit Vietnam. It’s a very influential country in world history on many, many levels, and remarkable in many ways.” She explains why in this piece.

As for Kate, she thought her post that sums up Vietnam best is Coming to Terms with the Vietnam War. It was very difficult coming to Vietnam as an American and witness how my country destroyed so many lives in the name of a war that never should have happened.

KATE MCCULLEY’S EXPERIENCES IN VIETNAM

Kate said she read a post called “Why I’ll Never Return to Vietnam” of a backpacker named Nomadic Matt. Many of his readers were in complete agreement; many more disagreed. So she tried to help a reader deciding whether or not she should skip Vietnam on her Southeast Asia trip.

She got asked this question all the time. That post of Matt’s freaked out a lot of people — particularly the female travelers who write to her. But considering how far that post of his has spread, she felf sad that people had skipped a wonderful, beautiful, delicious country just because one popular travel blogger didn’t like it.

She said she love Vietnam. In her impression, Vietnam is a fantastic country and if you skipped it, you would be missing out on a lot. The food, in her opinion, is the best in Southeast Asia. The scenery is gorgeous, featuring everything from beaches to mountains to terraced rice paddies. The cities are fun, diverse, and fascinating, and there are so many activities in Vietnam, from getting custom designer sneakers in Hoi An to sailing through Halong Bay or cruising Nha Trang to drinking snake blood in Hanoi.

That said, Vietnam can be difficult. Scams are quite prevalent in Vietnam, though all of the scams she personally witnessed took place within Hanoi. Most of the scamming is in the form of overcharging you or not giving you everything you paid for.

Her personal advice? Go to Vietnam — but keep your eyes open. Give Vietnam a chance.

Wanderlust Tips | Cinet

Melia Hanoi introduces new speed dial number and September promotions

In this September, Melia Hanoi Hotel offers customers a wide range of exciting culinary and entertainment offers. In addition, Melia Hanoi also introduced to new speed dial number # 7666 for more convenience when contacting.

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SEPTEMBER PROMOTIONS

At El Patio Restaurant:

– Birthday promotion: On your month of birth, enjoy the discount % equivalent to your age while celebrating at El Patio Restaurant at Melia Hanoi. Your party will even be more fun with a special birthday cake personally prepared by Ms. Le Phi Phuong – Pastry Chef. Remember to present your identity card to enjoy such privileges.

– Seafood Extravaganza: Every Friday and Saturday dinner, the chef team at El Patio Restaurant is proud to present most expanded gastronomic selection of seafood in town, featuring the freshest and most luscious ingredients.

“Dine 4 pay 3” promotion applied from 6pm to 10pm Every Friday & Saturday

VND 825,000++/adult (without drinks)
VND 890,000++/adult (including free flow of draught beer and soft drinks)
VND 1,170,000++/adult (including free flow of 6 red wines & 3 white wines)

International daily buffet dinner applied from 6pm to 10pm From Monday to Thursday

VND 560,000++/adult (without drinks)
VND 625,000++/adult (including free flow of draught beer and soft drinks)
VND 905,000++/adult (including free flow of 6 red wine & 3 white wine)

At Cava Lounge:

– Summer refresher menu: Beat the heat with a new “Refresher Summer Treat” menu especially off-ered by Meliá Hanoi at Cava Lounge for this hot season 2017. From sweet and fruity to light and creamy, few things are as refreshing as the cooler mocktails, infused iced tea and delicious sorbet that guarantee to cool you o¬ff while the weather heats up.
– Live Music: Sway to the sounds of the great song selection brought by our in-house band in a cozy atmosphere at Cava Lounge. The charming voice of Tina from Cuba every Wednesday and Friday will make your evening more special. Time: From Tuesday to Friday, 7pm – 9pm
– Happy Hour: Start your evening off in style and get 1 complimentary drink when ordering from our great selections of drinks. Time: Everyday from 6:30pm – 8:30pm

MELIA HANOI INTRODUCES NEW SPEED DIAL NUMBER *7666

Meliá Hanoi Hotel has currently launched a new speed dial number *7666. From now on, whenever you want to call Melia Hanoi, just simply pick up your phone and dial *7666 correlating to *ROOM! Our operator will be very pleased to offer proper assistance. (Applied only for phone in Vietnam network).

Moreover, download ONE SMART STAR APP through to QR code to explore our visual IVR (phone call, booking engine, website, navigation, email, promotions and many more).

Melia Hanoi’s General Manager, Guillermo Pantoja happily shares: “It’s about takes one step closer to our customer. People get used to using smartphone apps nowadays. So with new speed dial number, it will be faster and easier for you to check up info or our news without any difficulty. We do hope it’s going to be useful with you”.

Melia Hanoi Hotel