traveller reviews

Beyond the Mekong

Great adventure!

Great adventure!

Beyond the Mekong

Beyond the Mekong

Beyond the Mekong

Beyond the Mekong

The food was amazing in both…

The food was amazing in both quantify and variety! And the hotel accommodations were much nicer than I expected, this was not "roughing it." I was the only native English speaker on the tour and next time I'm going to confirm, before I sign up, that there will be other English conversant fellow travelers. Otherwise much of the benefit of traveling with a group is lost.

A very professional set up with…

A very professional set up with very friendly and exceptionally helpful crew. I would certainly recommend vintage rides. I helped Suzie VR promote vintage rides at the NEC BIRMINGHAM and I hope to help her out again at Excel in February.

Beyond the Mekong

Beyond the Mekong

One Grey area is the float…

One Grey area is the float we have for food and drinks as we don’t know the budget. With our Nepal trip Francoise paid for our lunch and dinner and if we went over our daily budget we topped up the money required. So we were very surprised when we had to pay for our evening meals and have no idea on the daily allowance used. Saying that we were certainly eating like kings every lunchtime! So my suggestion is more transparency is required so we know how is set aside and then we know how to budget for our evening meals. Certainly this will important for more expensive countries like South Africa.

It was my second trip with…

It was my second trip with Vintage Rides and it certainly didn't disappoint. I once again found them a very professional and well run organisation with the depth of experience and support to provide a truly smoothly run and memorable trip. I would have no hesitation in recommending VR highly. Some of the group commented that they would have liked to have stopped for photo opportunities more regularly. Although Tristan said several times that we should just stop when we wanted this was not practical in reality as in most circumstances the road and terrain mean that the guide can only maintain visual contact with the following 4 or 5 riders (less in dust) so if any of the back group stopped they would become separated from the lead group. The procedures for this could have been better explained and organised, for example perhaps each rider should check the one behind and stop in turn if they lost sight. This would eventually make it to the front of the pack so the guide was aware. My suggestions for improvement would be to provide a basic coms system so that the guide has a radio link with the last rider. The guide could have a helmet set and the last rider a hand held (as this position is swapped around) in the case of an accident, someone wanting to stop (e.g. to take scenic photographs) or in the case of the group being split in traffic and losing the way.

GENERALLY ANOTHER FANTASTIC TRIP. LAOS WAS…

GENERALLY ANOTHER FANTASTIC TRIP. LAOS WAS NOWHERE NEAR AS INTENSE AS NEPAL FOR RIDING CHALLENGE, BUT WE KNEW THAT BEFORE WE CAME. DID FEEL SLIGHTLY LIKE THERE WAS AN ATTEMPT TO SQUEEZE MONEY OUT OF US. CONSIDERING WE ARE A CONFIRMED GROUP OF 9 PEOPLE, A COUPLE OF THE HOTELS APPEARED TO HAVE BEEN CHOSEN ON PRICE (WHEN THERE WERE OTHER BETTER HOTELS NEARBY THAT WOULD LIKELY HAVE COST LITTLE MORE). ALSO, WHEN IN NEPAL THE DINNERS WERE INCLUDED IN THE TRIP (LESS ALCOHOL) SO WE WERE SURPRISED THIS TIME WHEN WE WERE TO PAY FOR THEM. ALBEIT NOT A MASSIVE ISSUE, WOULD HAVE BEEN GOOD TO HAVE BEEN TOLD THIS PRIOR TO THE TRIP. BUT GENERALLY ANOTHER GREAT TRIP, A GREAT GUIDE IN TRISTAN AND A GREAT EXPERIENCE. NOW TO DETOX!

I think you should make all…

I think you should make all trips all inclusive. Nepal was but Laos was not. I would not hesitate in booking another tour with VR probably market leaders. You need to promote your tours in the UK. We buy more adventure bikes as a country than any other in the world. That tells you something. See you in 2021 .