Ride Vietnam on the back lanes, not the highway
We run guided cycling tours and supported motorbike tours the length of Vietnam, on our own bikes, with our own mechanics and a support vehicle behind every group.
Start here
Three different questions bring people to a Vietnam biking site, and they are weeks apart. You might be deciding whether to ride here at all. You might have settled on Ha Giang and be working out how to do it. Or you might be ready to book and want a price. The three paths below go to those three places.
Pick a tour
Six routes, four on a bicycle and two on a motorbike, each with day-by-day distances, climbing metres and a price table.
Read about a region
What Ha Giang, Pu Luong and the Mekong Delta are actually like to ride, including the months you should stay away.
Work out the how
Which months work in which half of the country, what bike you will be given, and what the support vehicle does when you stop riding.
What we run
Four cycling routes and two motorbike routes. We keep the list short on purpose: every route below is one our guides ride several times a season, so the answers you get about road surface, traffic and where to eat are current rather than remembered.
| Tour | Days | On the bike | Climbing | From |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hanoi to Ho Chi Minh City | 14 | 690 km ridden | 6,400 m | USD 2,450 |
| Mai Chau and Pu Luong | 4 | 182 km | 2,750 m | USD 520 |
| Hue to Hoi An over Hai Van | 5 | 218 km | 2,100 m | USD 640 |
| Mekong Delta back lanes | 3 | 146 km | under 200 m | USD 390 |
| Ha Giang Loop, motorbike | 4 | 348 km ridden | — | USD 390 |
| Northwest Loop, motorbike | 6 | 1,060 km ridden | — | USD 690 |
Every one of those routes runs as a private departure for your own party. Four of them also run as set-departure groups on fixed dates, capped at twelve riders. The pricing page shows what the difference costs and why.
Why book a ride through us rather than a general tour operator
Not because we care more. Because of four things you can check.
We own the bikes
Forty-two bicycles and eleven motorbikes in one Hanoi workshop, serviced between trips by our own two mechanics rather than rented in on the morning you arrive.
A vehicle rides behind you
On every cycling day. It carries spare wheels, water, your day bag and a roof rack, and it will take you and your bike the rest of the way whenever you have had enough.
Distances published before you pay
Every riding day on this site shows kilometres, climbing metres, road surface and the length of the transfer. If a day is 96 km with 1,400 m of climbing, it says so.
One guide per six riders
A group of twelve rides with two guides and a driver. Above six riders on hilly routes we split the group by pace so nobody spends the day waiting or chasing.
Roughly what it costs
Land only, per person, two sharing a room, riding on our bike. Flights into Vietnam are yours. These are the bands most trips land in, not a quote.
| Style | Per person per day | What that buys |
|---|---|---|
| Simple | USD 110 – 150 | Homestays and family-run hotels, group departure, one guide, shared vehicle |
| Standard | USD 160 – 240 | Three-star and good local hotels, private departure, guide plus driver |
| Comfortable | USD 250 – 400 | Four-star where it exists, private departure, second vehicle on long days |
| Motorbike, guided | USD 95 – 140 | Bike, fuel, guide, homestay or hotel, luggage carried by van |
The pricing page breaks that down to supplier level: hotel per night, van per day, guide per day, bike per day. It also lists the six ways a quote gets to be 25 per cent cheaper than ours, because most of them are worth knowing before you compare.
How a booking actually goes
- You send the form at the bottom of this page, or write to us. Include your height and inside leg if you already know you want a road bike.
- We reply within one working day with either a route we already run, or a modified version of one, and an itemised price.
- We hold nothing and charge nothing until you have seen the day-by-day plan with distances and hotel names in it.
- A 30 per cent deposit confirms the trip. The balance is due 30 days before you ride, or on arrival in cash if you prefer.
- The evening before day one, you meet your guide, get fitted on the bike, and swap anything that does not suit you — saddle, pedals, stem, the whole bike.
The fitting session is not a formality. About one rider in five changes something, usually the saddle or the stem length, and it is far easier to do in the workshop the night before than at kilometre 40 the next morning.
Who we are not right for
Four kinds of trip we turn down, roughly once a week between them.
- Unsupported bikepacking. If the point is to be self-sufficient with panniers and no vehicle, you do not need us, and paying us would be paying for the thing you are trying to avoid.
- Groups over thirty on a single road. We run corporate and charity rides up to about 120 riders, but only with a full closure plan and a lead time of three months. A large group booked six weeks out is a group we will disappoint.
- Riders who want to hire a motorbike and go alone. We do not rent bikes without a guide. It is a licensing and insurance position, not a sales one, and the bikes and support page explains it.
- Racing. No timed stages, no closed-road criteriums, no drafting behind the support vehicle. Vietnamese traffic does not forgive that.
Questions travellers ask most
Do I need to be a cyclist to do one of these tours?
For the Mekong Delta route, no. It is flat, the days are 40 to 55 km, and people who last rode a bike on holiday manage it comfortably.
For Mai Chau and Pu Luong, yes — there are two climbs of over 500 metres and you will want to have ridden 50 km in a day at least once before you come. The north-to-south route assumes you ride regularly.
Can I bring my own bike?
Yes, and about one rider in eight does. We deduct the bike hire from the price, meet you at the airport with a van big enough for the bike box, and store the box while you ride.
Bring your own pedals, a spare hanger and a spare tyre. Our mechanics carry tools for standard groupsets, but hangers are model-specific and nothing in Hanoi will have yours.
What happens if I cannot finish a day?
You get in the van. This happens on most trips, usually on day two when the heat catches somebody out, and it is not treated as a failure by anyone.
The van carries a rack for four bikes, so a whole small group can stop riding at once if the weather turns.
Is riding a bicycle in Vietnam dangerous?
Riding on Highway 1 is dangerous and we do not put groups on it except for short, unavoidable linking sections. Almost all of our riding is on provincial and district roads where the traffic is motorbikes, buffalo and school children.
Our guides ride at the front and back of the group, we do not ride after dark, and every rider wears a helmet and a high-visibility gilet. In eleven years we have had broken collarbones and no fatality, which is the honest answer rather than a claim of a perfect record.
Read next
Tell us about the ride you have in mind
Dates, party size and the places you care about are enough to start. You get a draft route and an indicative price, not a brochure.