Airport Help - Bangkok or Ho Chi Minh City? Phu Quoc or HCMC?

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Courtkat67
Courtkat67

My fiance and I are planning a trip to Vietnam/Cambodia. We want to book a couple of flights in advance and need some help.

We will be landing in Hanoi on October 11th. We want to spend about 8-10 days in Northern Vietnam (Sapa, Halong Bay, Hanoi) before heading south for some island hopping (South Vietnam, Cambodia, and/or Northern Vietnam).

A couple of questions:
1. Should we fly from Hanoi to HCMC or to Phu Quoc? It looks like those are our best 2 options, but we are open to suggestions.
2. Should we plan to fly home out of Bangkok or HCMC? Those look like the two more affordable options to get us home to the states.

After we fly out of Hanoi (around October 19th), we have about 3 weeks until we need to fly home. Our major goal for that part of the trip is islands/beaches. We would also love to spend some time on the Mekong and possibly see the Anghor Wat, but only if time allows. For now, we just want to get our flights scheduled and then play it by ear. Any advice is much appreciated.

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Mp63
Mp63

If you fly home from Vietnam, you will need a multiple entry visa to re enter for your return flight, so
I'd opt to fly out of Bangkok. If you fly Hanoi to Phu quoc, then you could then go through the Mekong Delta to Ho chi Minh, and then on to Phnom Penh, or avoid Hi chi Minh entirely and go from Phu quoc to Kep in Cambodia. If you fly Hanoi to Ho chi Minh, then you can visit the Delta en route to Phu quoc, or go direct to Phnom Penh. I don't think it really matters which way you do it, just try to avoid backtracking. You need to decide which places you really want to see, and which you can miss out.

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mstep
mstep

Unless your Vietnam visa is a multiple entry one, I'd say fly out of Thailand too. It's only one travel day from Siem Reap to Bangkok by bus.

If you fly to Pho Quoc, you can visit the Mekong Delta without taking time for HCMC. And cross into Cambodia to Phnom Pehn using the Chau Doc border. The Ha Tien border is just near the Pho Quoc ferry landing, so you wouldn't see the Mekong delta at all if you go that way.

On the other hand, taking a bit more time, you could fly into HCMC, see the Mekong Delta and go overland to Pho Quoc, and use the Ha Tien border to cross into Cambodia. The advantage of doing that is you don't have to go through Phnom Penh, and using Ha Tien, you are a short distance from Kampot, Kep, and the Cambodia beach islands.

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adancopper82
adancopper82

Personally, you should transfer from HCMC to Phu Quoc which will be better than transferring from Hanoi. You can spend 1 night in HCMC to enjoy the exciting atmosphere in there and then visiting Phu Quoc island.

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