Max & Lorraine Brown
Vietnam Trip

Dear Dzung Trinh,
Now that we are home in New Zealand my wife and I wish to thank you and your staff for making our stay in Vietnam such a wonderful experience.
We enjoyed every moment of our stay and all our travel and transfers went completely smoothly for which we have to thank TNK Travel.
Your country and people have left a lasting impression on us. Everyone was so friendly and helpful. We would love to return and will recommend to any of our friends, thinking of travelling, that they visit Vietnam, particularly Ho Chi Minh city, and that they contact TNK Travel.

Thanks again for your assistance.
Best regards to you all.
Max & Lorraine Brown.

The Kane family
A wonderful experience with TNK travel (January 2009)

Our family of 4 just came back from first ever trip to Vietnam (18 days). We chose TNK Travel and it was a great trip. I wanted to thank TNK and to share our experience with future prospective travelers.

We started the planning almost a year ago. I must say we were hesitant at first and concerned about choosing a reliable travel agency. I read a lot on the internet (e.g. tripadvisor .com) before identifying a few prospective travel agencies. I then asked for an initial quote from my top 3 choices. TNK was the middle quote but what I liked about them was the level of detail in their initial proposal. I then looked at their guestbook and selected 17 people worldwide who recently travelled with them and emailed each of them to ask about their experience. Every single one of them responded and all were very positive about TNK. This made me comfortable with the idea of having to send money upfront to book a trip in an unknown country where I would have no recourse if dealing with an unethical company. With TNK, everyone assured me that once an itinerary is finalized, the company will do whatever is needed to deliver on its promises and to make it a pleasant experience, and they sure did in our case.

Over the following month, I exchanged several emails with Mr. Dsung Trinh, the Managing Director, to modify the original proposal based on my research about the sites we wanted to see. For example, we removed Sapa from the itinerary because the Northwest is quite cold in January, but added Phu Quoc Island instead. In the end, we agreed on a price for the revised itinerary, and I paid the customary 30% deposit by credit card (with a 3% fee). From that point-on, I dealt with Mr. Dac Dahn in their operations department who always promptly answered my numerous enquiries via email, and sent me hotel vouchers and e-tickets confirmation from air travel within Vietnam, as well as the invitation letter for the Visa. Fast forwarding to the end of the year when our trip began:

We landed roughly on schedule in Hochiminh on Dec. 31st in the evening and had to wait an hour or so (not ideal after a long flight from the U.S.) to get our visa on arrival ($25 per person in cash). Once we exited immigration and customs, our guide (J.J.) and driver were there to greet us with a sign bearing our name. They took us to our hotel. Because of the traffic, we ended up being in the center of the city near the cathedral at midnight, surrounded by thousands of motorcycles ringing their horns when the near year arrived (quite a cultural experience). From there on, the entire trip was very pleasant (I will post details on the hotels on tripadvisor.com). We visited Saigon (and stopped by the TNK office to pay the balance of the trip), the Mekong Delta, Phu Quoc, PanThiet/Mui Ne, Da Lat and Nha Trang by private van and boats with J.J. (who was excellent, paying attention all the time to what we liked and making sure we would always have it). We almost missed the speedboat from Rach Gia to Phu Quoc, because the itinerary was 30 minutes off. As a result, we couldn’t have a scheduled lunch, but TNK compensated us with an excellent previously unplanned dinner in Hue. J.J. ordered a van with more legroom when we returned from Phu Quoc to HCMC (we flew back), arranged for a small canoe to pick-us up and take us to our hotel in Cantho where we were stuck in traffic on the way to the ferry, etc…Then we flew to Danang and were greeted by our new guide Tui (Mr. Dac Dahn had kindly arranged for French speaking guides at the other locations at our request), and from there visited Hoi An, My Son and Hue, Tui was excellent as well, very knowledgeable and helped us solve an issue we had with a tailor-made suit. In Hoi An, the reservation was not a river view room, but after contacting Mr. Dac Dahn generously agreed to pay the difference and we were upgraded accordingly (we had insisted on 2 deluxe rooms with sea/river/lake views everywhere) and I had not noticed it was not the case at that location. We then flew to Hanoi which we visited with our last guide (Mr. Lan, who was OK but not as good as the first 2), and went from there to Halong Bay for a memorable 2-day cruise, then flew back to HCMC, stayed overnight near the airport and had an early morning flight back to the U.S. On returning to HCMC, no driver was there to greet us, we were told after we called the agency that he was stuck in traffic due to an accident. We took a taxi to the nearby hotel, and the driver who picked-us up in the morning for our return flight to the US. reimbursed us more than we had actually paid for the taxi. We didn’t have to pay a departure tax, it was apparently already included in our plane tickets.

Overall, a great trip thanks to the logistics, efficiency and professionalism of the TNK staff and agents. Food was excellent (though too copious for us, we always have festive lunch menus booked by TNK with 6 or 7 courses in nice restaurants (included in the price), nice buffet breakfasts in most hotels. The only problem (which is beyond TNK’s control) was insufficient hot water in many hotels for two people to take showers one after the other), a really bad road with big holes when exiting MuiNe to go to Da Lat and a third guide in the north who took us to a number of expensive stores along the road when we saw much cheaper prices elsewhere (we suspect he had a kick-back from these stores (but to his credit, he advised us to see the anthropology museum in Hanoi instead of a couple of extra pagodas, which we really enjoyed). Other than these minor opportunities for improvement, we had great hotel rooms with very nice views (important to us), good weather, good food, good guides and drivers (who seemed satisfied with the tips we gave them), and we were taken to all the places agreed-to on the itinerary. For those who do not feel adventurous enough to be on their own in Vietnam, we do strongly recommend TNK travel as an ideal, reasonably-priced solution. You can count on them for a memorable and pleasant trip. One final comment, although you can pay everything in Vietnam in US dollars or Euros, prices are cheaper if you pay in Dongs (local currency, FX at 17.3 VND/USD on the average during our trip, calculated at 15 by the stores if you pay in USD). Also a word of caution, Vietnam Airlines only allows 20 kg for a checked suitcase and 7 kg for a carry-on so travel light……

If you are thinking of going and have any question about our experience, don’t hesitate to contact me at dkane@mmm.com.

Our sincere thanks to MM. Trinh, Danh and the entire TNK staff for a wonderful trip. The Kane family (Austin, TX, USA)

Rosa Fonti
Greetings and Thanksgivings

Dear Mrs. Luu Vo!

first of all, my apologies for writing so late.

I would like to thank you so much for the very nice present we got from Mr. JJ on you behalf!

We appreciated it a lot and once again let me say we are very grateful for the very nice tour we are enjoying throughout Indochina.

Our guides and drivers in Vietnam, Cambodia and now in Laos wereare very good, and the accomodations and restaurants always very nice.

We will definitely recommend your travel agency and the tour to anyone we can.

Again thanks a lot and our best regards,

Rosa Fonti

Doreen Neo (from Singapore)
Thank you, TNK Travel

My friend, Poon Ee Ping and myself had signed up for a 10 days customised package with TNK Travel in May 2006. We had enjoyed ourselves a lot. TNK Travel had taken good care of us during our trip. The tour guides were very friendly and helpful. The accomodation we had during our stay throughout Vietnam was good. The lunch catered for us were great too.

I would recommend my friends to sign up with TNK Travel if they go to Vietnam. Thanks once again.

karen toft
Thank you

Hi Winston – a note of thanks for our wonderful trip to Vietnam. Everything went without a hitch – absolutely superb !!! The guides were fantastic as was the country and all the places we went and people we met. The trip covered a variety of sites, activities and experiences so I congratulate you on organizing it for us.

I have only one comment to make and that’s regarding tipping the tour guides. As we don’t tip in Australia , nor do the Vietnamese, but considering the poor wages we had no idea what to tip and we couldn’t tip the guide without the driver. Perhaps giving some guide to future travelers would be of benefit. We overtipped in the beginning but got it figured out by the end after asking Mr Danh & Mr Trang. Also we weren’t sure about tipping the boat drivers considering we were the only ones on the boat eg on Perfume River and Halong Bay.

This is a trivial issue in the big scheme of things so I want to make more the point about the fabulous timing and thought you put into our time there. Again , many thanks.

Regards………..karen Toft & Clive Hockey

Shaun McCree
Cambodia Exclusive 5-day tour

Dear Nhu Y,

After our initial misunderstanding over payment (my fault entirely), I would like you to know that the tour went excellently. A friendly & helpful guide in Phnom Penh made our day both pleasant & informative, even if we were rather devastated by the Killing Fields & S21. Although they are hard to take, we think everyone should see them to understand what happened in Kampuchea. Our guide in Siem Reap, Marouan, & his driver were if anything even better and our trips around the Angkor complex were absolutely unforgettable. The Hotel Salina in Siem Reap was good value for money, despite being the cheapest available but we were a little disappointed with the Princess in Phnom Penh where we found the food rather poor & the staff rather disinterested. We recognise this is also the cheapest option but clearly does not match up to the budget hotels we stayed in throughout our 4 weeks in Vietnam. Our only small problem was that the advertisement on your website suggests lunch is provided everyday although, on checking your acknowledgement, it was not listed. Perhaps someone could correct the website.

Jerry&Leslie Beilman
Vietnam Tour
Thank you for the great guides you provided, we had a wonderful time in vietman and even though we had some problems we were extremly happy with our tour from saigon to hanoi we will be back for sure.

Selina
THANK YOU

Special Thanks to Mr Le Hung Kiet from your Dalat Office
Words cannot express our heartful THANKS to him
Mr Le was very responsible and helpful.

Thank you for your Excellence Service

I would certainly recommend our friends in Singapore
to use TNK Travel if they are going to Vietnam

marianne Kant-Schaps
Mekong Delta tour 2 days/1night Aug 9th -10th 2011

Dear Luu Vo!

At the end of our Vietnam travel I would like to thank you very much for the organisation of our Mekong Delta tour, which was really a great pleasure for our family. It was also a pleasure to meet your local guide and to see so many interesting spots of your beautiful country.

Best regards, Marianne Kant

Michelle Davis
Feedback

I was interested in visiting Vietnam and found TNK Travel through a search engine. I was a little sceptical about booking online as sometimes you do not get what you paid for. My experience with TNK Travel exceeded my expectations. I was met by our lovely tour guide Nhy in Hochiminh city and she absolutely looked after us. The holiday was very relaxing and experienced with ease. I travelled from HCMC - Hanoi and every experience with the guides and drivers were great.

I would very much recommend TNK Travel. Vietnam is a wonderful place to visit and the people are lovely.

The tour I experienced was good value for money.

Michelle Davis - Sydney, Australia