The Jungles and Shores of Central Vietnam

Ten nights through central Vietnam on a Royal Enfield, entirely on tarmac, running inland on the Ho Chi Minh Road and back to the coast. It is the newest of the operator’s Vietnamese routes.

Hoi An opens it, a UNESCO listed trading port of lantern-lit streets, then Phu Ninh by way of Mỹ Sơn, where the brick temple towers of the Cham civilisation stand in a jungle valley and have done since the fourth century. A So follows on the Ho Chi Minh Road itself, with the Laos border country alongside and a Cotu dance in the evening.

Hue comes next, the imperial capital under the Nguyen dynasty, with the tomb of Khai Dinh and a viewpoint known simply as The Hill. Khe Sanh follows along the Tam Giang lagoon and Route 9, past the Quang Tri citadel and the Bo De school, and finishes at the open-air museum on the old combat base. The war is not incidental on this route: it runs through the ground where much of it happened, and the operator treats the sites as history rather than spectacle.

Phong Nha is next through mountain forest and waterfalls into a UNESCO limestone karst system, with a rest day for the boat into the cave itself and kayaking, cooking or a jungle hike as options. Dong Hoi follows with a loop of the national park, a former airbase, a swim at the Nuoc Mooc spring and an evening on the beach. The return to Hue takes in the Vinh Moc tunnels, where a whole village lived underground through the bombing. Bike rental is included and the price is quoted per person.