Luxury Cambodia, Thailand, & Vietnam Tour Review: Bangkok, Siem Reap, Angkor Wat, Halong Bay, Hanoi, Photography, Local Tours...

In Viet Nam we were scheduled to take an excursion to an outlying town from Hanoi, but when we heard that it was a "touristy" town, we asked if our guide could find an alternative place a little more intimate. We ended up in one of the highlights of our trip - a town where we toured for four hours and did not see another Westerner. We saw how rice paper was made and got invited into a local's house for tea and had a most interesting conversation. I was concerned where we would eat in this small town and we were taken to one of our best meals of the trip.

One of my traveling companions was interested in photography and he made arrangements with another guide to be picked up at 5:30AM to get the right light for photos of Angkor Wat. He said the ride on the back of the motor scooter thru Siem Reap in the dark was most memorable.

We also stopped at a Buddhist temple where there was a festival taking place and once again we were the only Westerners. Seeing the ceremony, which involved throwing bolts of cloth to be blessed by draping over the Buddha, was a sight we will all remember. The accuracy of the bolt throwing to a high platform was astonishing.