Itinerary Change - Less than 2 Weeks Notice!

Less than 2 weeks from departure, we received word from Intrepid that there was a problem with our itinerary... read-on to hear what happened.

We started planning this trip a couple years ago, after Gary (my brother) mentioned going back to Vietnam was on his bucket-list. Once the family got wind of it, they were going to make sure he went.

It took a couple years for everything to come together on schedules, hoping Rita and I could go along. Gary wanted to go during Tet, the Vietnamese New Year, so last summer we started planning in earnest. The first thing we did was review the trip Rita and I took several years ago. While we planned most of our trip ourself, we used Intrepid Travel for part of Africa. We knew they operated in SE Asia and it turns out they had the perfect Vietnam itinerary.

Intrepid is a socially responsible travel company that works with small groups and flexible itineraries. They arrange transportation and accommodations, as well as provide a trip leader to assist along the way. It's not luxury travel, but we're not the type of people who want to stay in the Holiday Inn or eat at American chain restaurants while abroad. They don't plan to-the-minute, cramming everyone into a bus to go shopping or on canned tours. Intrepid uses comfortable accommodations near interesting places - pointing out places that employ youth, provide training or perform community development.

Anyway... a little over a week ago Intrepid told us two of the overnight trains they were going to book, getting us through Vietnam to the area's Gary wanted to see, were not available! What? That's okay, they were going to put us on a bus 10 hours for two separate days, eating up time we planned for exploring. Huh? Not cool.

We contacted Intrepid, who explained that there were difficulties with travel during Tet. Understandable, but that's why we had booked with them in the first place, because of their experience on-the-ground. We were not happy.

Then God stepped in and an solution presented itself. We really didn't need to go through Nah Trang to get where we wanted. Sure nuff, we found reasonalble direct flights to Da Nang from Ho Chi Minh City. Intrepid stepped up and arranged for transfers in both cities and moved our hotel reservations around. So, not only are we getting more time in Hoi An and Da Nang (which is where Gary was stationed) we're missing two long overland trips (either train or bus).

So, keep your fingers crossed that our improvised combination direct/Intrepid itinerary mashup works!