Ninh Binh Full Day Tour To Hoa Lu Tam Coc Mua Cave Buffet Lunch

luca is a very attentive and accommodating tour guide. very informative tour and well planned. tour was fun and the river ride was beautiful.

Our tour guide, Boa, made the trip a 5 plus with his sense of humor and knowledge of destinations. Ninh Binh is a treasure in itself with a spectacular view from above. After climbing 400 steps, you are awarded with a postcard view of the land. The boat ride from Cam Toc offered a fun ride through caves, and the person rowing you down the river uses his/her legs instead of arms. King Kong was filmed here. Lunch buffet is generous in selections of food, including their famous goat dishes. Don't miss out on this tour if you are in Hanoi.

Great tour overall and a good value for the price. Our guide Thao was very kind and personable and spoke great English. Hoa Lu was honestly not as interesting as I anticipated, but it was still a good way to learn about more about Vietnam’s history and culture. The bike ride was very fun and had great views. I would have loved it were longer, since it was only about 30 minutes. The buffet lunch was great and had a huge variety of foods available. The boat ride through Tam Coc was a bit long, but it’s very pretty and a nice way to relax while supporting the locals who do the rowing. My favorite part was the short hike at the end, which had amazing views of Ninh Binh, and Tam Coc in particular, at the top and was a fun little workout (though there’s also a shorter option with it’s own views if this isn’t your thing). There’s also a ton of ice cream and cold beverages at the bottom, which are extra refreshing after the climb. The hike is just stairs, so no need to bring special shoes. The only thing that was annoying was the pickup/drop off. While it sounds nice to get picked up from your accommodations, what it means is that you have to wait in the bus as it struggles to weave through the chaos of old quarter to pick everyone up. I would’ve preferred if they picked us all up from (and dropped us all off at) a designated meeting spot, which would be easy for everyone since the old quarter is pretty small anyway. This might already be an option when you sign up, but I don’t remember.

We had a very pleasant experience with Thao. She is very sweet and she was very informative about Ninh Binh. She was kind enough to invite us to her home and help her cook various vietnamese dishes. She made our two night stay in Ninh Binh a wonderful experience. Will definitely recommend !

There are a lot of tours doing this itinerary so there is always a crowd at each stop regardless of your group size. Lunch is in a restuarant used by many groups. It's a big day and the guide did a reasonable job of herding us around. Watch out for the rowers who will try to extort a large tip out of you before they return. Ours stopped rowing until we 'tipped' her. Touters everywhere as to be expected and they do get physical. Try and get a precise pickup time otherwise you run the risk of the driver turning up at 7.20am before you have had breakfast. It isn't a 8am start.

Our guide, Leo was really knowledgeable with history and sharing for our trip in Ninh Bhin. Overall, I would like to thank Cristine for her swift and prompt reply with all the arrangements for my activities in Vietnam from Halong Bay to Ninh Bhin. I contacted her before my trip, and in between to make last minute arrangement including during the independence day period and she replied swiftly and smoothly. Would recommend this travel agency to make any arrangement for your tours in Hanoi!

Great trip . Thao was my guide . She was excellent. Friendly and very knowledgeable. Thai was also a very accomplished photographer. She took loads of photos for me . Highly recommend.

After being picked up in our hotel, we met our guide; miss Thao. She was really wonderful and pleasant. She took us to a lot of places and made sure we had a great day. We went to the old temple and the new pagode. After that we climbed the high stairs to enjoy the magic view to continue with a 90 minute boot trip. And they’ll finally we had a bike tour to visit the the ancient pagoda’s. All was well organized and the driver and Miss Thao aldus had water for us at hand! A big thank you!

We had a great trip. Amazing guide we got. Very co-operative staff. When we visited it was Vietnam's new year but still they gave their best to let us enjoy. Mind blowing and memorable trip it was. Thanks K..😊

Had a beautiful bike ride from our bungolow to the Pagoda, with a lovely tour guide named Thao. So many spots for photos 👌. The ride was nice, with fresh air and excellent misty mountain views. The Pagoda was steeped with culture, being built hundreds of years ago. I recommend this tour to everyone!

Me and my husband had a wonderful day on this tour! Highly recommend! We were greeted by Tommy who started our morning off with lots of smiles and so many laughs. While on the bus ride Tommy took his time to talked to everyone on the tour and make us all feel welcome. Everyone was smiling and laughing so hard we cried. This tour was a combo of everything. Some history while visiting the ancient capital in Hoa Lu, a wonderful bike ride around a local village, a tasty local lunch buffet, a gnarly hike (with many steps) up the Mua Cave with panoramic views, and then getting on a boat in Tam Coc to be completely blown away by the stunning and beautiful views down a river filled with paddy fields, cave systems, and views that look like a painting. Everything about this day was awesome. If you have a full day here then this tour is a MUST! Also if you have the pleasure of booking with Tommy then you will be in good hands and have so much fun!

Absolute top man, otherwise this pregnant (slightly overweight Irish man 😜🍀🍀) would not have carried him up 7 steps at Mua Cave - that’s all I could manage in my condition. Great craic and fully of beans 👍

We had a wonderful trip today with our very funny tour guide Tommy (Tea)! Thank you so much for all the laughter!

Tommy was absolutely amazing. He came full of energy, got the crowd going through out the bus tour and also gave us an interesting history of all the places we visited. A truly hilarious comedian who made us laugh our heads off. This is a trip not to be missed and can assure you, you will have a memorable day.

Tour guide was very friendly, filled with energy and very helpful. itinerary was also very good! other than the mediocre buffet this was a perfect day tour

Good organisation, nice and funny guide Tommy and beautiful scenary. Unfortunately it rained when we were in the boat, but still a good experience.

I would call it Perfecto, he is very nice n kind, very helpful n full of information. He managed to guide us even though we are from different location n regroup in one tour. I call him as amazing Tommy. Very recommended to others n his is an asset to Vietnam tour operators in Hanoi. Best regards

Thao gave us a great tour of Mua cave - it was very beautiful in the fog. She also arranged a very nice lunch.

Hoa Lu - The temple was a lot smaller than I expected. Bike Ride - The bike ride was short and the view wasn't that great. Lunch - This was buffet style. Tam Coc - Long, but enjoyable boat ride. The tour guide warned us in advance about potential scams and tipping. Mua Cave - This was my favorite part of the tour as I enjoyed the view once we hiked to the top. Wish we had more time to explore the area. The group size is small. I was the only solo person which made it difficult to talk to people.

Thao was very attentive to our needs, and catered every detail for the private tour. Would recommend

We had a super fun day in Ninh Binh with our tour guide Tommy! Ninh Binh is a place you must see when you are in Vietnam and his tour is really good.

We had great fun touring Ninh Binh with our tour guide Tommy. He was very friendly and helped us out with our little ones. Very knowledgeable as well. Overall a fantastic trip. Highly recommended.

Great tour amazing sights , boat trip was excellent vuewd from the mountain s well worth seeing Tommy was a great tour guide, would definitely recommend. Just ask Tommy mot to sing ha ha .

We had an amazing tour today. Our tour was Hoa Lu - Tam Coc tour. Tommy was very friendly, informative, and professional. We originally booked a 2 day 1 night tour and joined his group for the second day. Our itinerary was supposed to include Bich Dong pagoda as well but his tour route did not include that. After several attempts to contact the parent tour company, Tommy just took the entire tour group to visit the beautiful pagoda anyway. But hey they got a free tour lol we finished around 4pm and got back to Ha Noi in time for dinner. Very accommodating and professional!

Had a wonderful day with Tommy, who made us feel at ease and comfortable during the trip. He made effort to gel the members together and paid special attention to small kids on board. A Highly recommended tour guide.

What an amazing day. Greeted very warmly by Tommy at the start who explained what the day entailed. Tommy has amazing enthusiasm and lots of energy that's infectious which made the day very enjoyable. He clearly loves what he does which makes it very genuine. Our group consisted of Australian Korean, Singaporeans, Vietnamese and Americans. Would highly recommend Tommy's tour

The trip was very good Enthusiastic tour guide, thoughtful. We started visiting Hoa Lu anceint capital city and then moved to get the bike around the village after that have a delicous lunch at local rétaurant I love the boat tour in trang an it is so beautiful n nice senery highly reccommend this tour with tommy

My trip is really nice. The tourguide, Mr. Tommy is friendly, dedicated and really helpful. I really enjoyed the journey and I really like the way the tour company prepared the traditional hats for us to wear. I also admired his knowlege on Vietnamese history.

Tommy has been an informative guide to us. He told us about the history of Hao Lu Capital City. I can see that he has the effort. We had lovely bicycle ride around Tam Coc village. I never expected that I am actually hiked the Mua Cave to see the Dragon & the view up there is amazing & surreal. Love the rowing boat experience too. Can see the location of KingKong film were made. Tq.

Absolutely lovely and fantastic experience at Ninh Binh. The journey was properly planned. Tommy show his efforts to provide information and history about the place that we've been to. Thank you for the wonderful experience ❤️

It was an incredible tour and aour tour guide Tommy was a fantastic guide. We really enjoy the day with him!

Hands down Thi is one of the friendliest and knowledgeable tour guide we ran into I would use him again the next time we are here.

We had the funniest guide in Vietnam today: Thi. We learned a lot about the land and history an also sang togehter. It was a really great day. We visit great landscapes, we will never forget. The boat trip was great too.

Got to see so much during the day! It was a bit of fog but beautiful anyway. Tommy was so fun and got the whole group together!

My day began with a minor problem, I was not picked up at my hotel as expected. I asked the hotel receptionist for help. She telephoned the tour company for me. Within minutes, Quang, our guide for the day arrived on his scooter. I jumped on the back and had a quick ride through the Hanoi Old Quarter to catch up with the tour bus. It was explained to me there had been a miscommunication between tour agent and operator as to where pick up was going to be, hotel or their office. Anyway the issue was quickly solved and forgotten. We set off on the two hour drive towards Ninh Binh, the bus was smooth, comfortable and safely driven! Quang explained that he was going to alter the order of the itinery so that we would not be climbing the steps at Mua Cave in the 30C heat predicted for later in the day. A good move, it also avoided crowds by going to Mua Cave earlier in the day. The views are fantastic on a good day and you earn it with the claimed 500 steps to the top of the view point. We then went to Hoa Lu the site of the original capital of ancient Vietman. Quang explained some of the history of the site and the dynastys.. We then had a buffet lunch, with what seemed like a large number of other tour groups. The food was ok, nothing special but nothing bad either. We then had a short bike ride to a scenic view point anf then headed off for the best activity of the day, for me, the boat trip at Tam Coc. This is a very relaxing 1.5 hour rowing boat trip in stunning scenery. In my opinion the near by Trang An is better but Tam Coc is by no means shabby. Our rower lady predictably asked for a tip, she was always goiing to get one from me but I'd prefer if it wasn't virtually demanded. Our guide Quang was a happy and funny young man, laughing and joking with us but also educating us about where we were. On the drive back to Hanoi he got his bamboo flutes ot and played some traditional Vietnamese music to us. Fantastic, never had live music on the tour bus before. I was not disappointed with this trip, the scenery is brilliant and makes for some goood photography. I had lots to smile about

I had a great day with Thi to Mua cave and Tam Coc. Hes very supportive with his good skills to give us an amazing experiences

This day trip was a very long day but we had a fantastic time. I booked the tour through Hanoi Explore Travel who are partners with Ninh Binh Excursions who ran the tour. Our guide was Phong and he did a brilliant job explaining each of the places we visited as well as keeping us amused. He called the toilet a “happy place” and always told us where we could find a happy place. After collecting everyone from their hotels in the Old Quarter, the driver (who Phong called Handsome) drove us south out of Hanoi. It took about 90 minutes to reach our first destination for the day (with a happy place stop along the way). Hoa Lu was the ancient capital of Vietnam but all that remains is the temple that honours the emperors of the time and their families. It was good to get out of the bus to stretch our legs but I didn’t find the temple anything special. Next stop was Mua Cave which is actually a limestone mountain with pagoda, Lady Buddha and a dragon on top. There are just under 500 steps to the top. The steps are made of concrete and lumps of rock. They are uneven and certainly not uniform. There is no handrail as such but you can use the concrete balustrading in places and the limestone of the mountain in other places, My husband took the longer route to the Lady Buddha and dragon. I had no intention of climbing very far but once I had reached the fork in the path which is two-thirds of the way, I elected to take the shorter path to the pagoda. Completing the climb gave me great view down over the rice fields below and the limestone mountains beside them but I couldn’t see the river that was on the other side. My husband got to the Lady Buddha but said getting to the dragon was difficult with so many people. He saw the river that we were to visit later. Overall the climb was well worth it but you just need to be well prepared with a hat and water to combat the heat and humidity. Unfortunately we didn’t have enough time to look at any of the shops at the base of the mountain. Next stop was a restaurant which served a buffet style lunch; mostly bain-maries with various rice and noodles dishes, stir fried vegetables, cooked meat and fried spring rolls. There was nothing that really appealed so I just had steamed rice, stir fried goat meat, caramel pork and a few spring rolls. We didn’t do the trip for the food. The next stop was the highlight of the day - a boat trip along the river and through 3 caves. We had a male rower, though it is mainly females that do the rowing. They are quite unique as they row using their feet. Due to recent flooding, the rice fields beside the river had been destroyed so we didn’t see the fields of rice seen in all the typical tourist pictures. Nevertheless the trip was very peaceful and the sections into the caves under the limestone mountains were amazing. The last part of the day was a bike ride along the streets of the village and then between the rice fields. I chose not to do this and instead sat and watched the rowers return on the river. Overall well worth it

Nice trip with Mr. Thi, We went to the old city, we do the boating about 2 hours. it was a wonderful experience. sea temples and beautiful king Kong movie site. Also visited Mua cave around 500 steps. planning to visit again soon.

I was picked up from my hotel (Friendly Home) and was brought by a car driver and my english speaking guide (Thao) to Trang An, where I made a very beautiful boat tour. The guide arranged the Tickets and brought me to the boat. Excellent. I was picked up after the boat tour and went together with my guide to Hua Lu Temple by car. I got a very clear explanation about the history of the temple. After that I were brought to a very good local Restaurant, and my guide took care that I will ne served vegan food. After lunch we went to Mua Cave and had a fantastic view of the Tam Coc area. My guide accompanied me and took Pictures, which was very nice. I really can recommend Thao as a guide and this company for individually touring in Ninh Binh area!!! Thank you.

Tommy and Nga were both excellent Guides. There were always very very friendly. They told us so mutch interesting facts about Vietnamese history and Vietnamese people. Additionally it was very entertaining and we spent so much time laughing. Thank you for this awesome trip.

Our trip to Ninh Binh was wonderful. Our tour guide Mr. Thi @ Tommy did a wonderful job to attend to all our needs. Well spoken and well mannered guy. Our food provided by Rubicon tours was great.

A fantastic day trip from Hanoi. Our guide Thomi was particularly helpful and enthusiastic. He worked really hard to make sure everyone had a lovely day.

Thi is the best guide.We enjoyed a lot for the day trips at Tam Coc and bicycling around the area.Highly recommend.

We spent a fantastic day today touring around the sights of Ninh Binh with Thao. She was an excellent guide with strong English and made sure we were comfortable throughout the day, answering all of our questions and sharing her extensive knowledge of the area. To top off a great day, Thao even invited us to her home for an authentic and delicious home cooked meal with her lovely family! It was an unforgettable experience and a highlight of our visit to Vietnam.

I am going to recommend to everyone I know to go on this tour! It was so fun and our guide Thi was very friendly, helpful, and funny. I had an amazing experience and I would do it again!!!

The trip was fantastic with our guide, we have a lot of fun together,I would like to say that this trip is make easier with thi. Because he is a very friendly nd he also very nice person. He has a very good knowledge about vietnam culture, history like so on. He speak very good english so this is very helpful for understanding nd make everything easier. In the last I say nd I suggest you if u want get trip in here then Thi is the best trip advisor for all.

THI Is amazing, wonderful trip for us. Very kind and helpful for everything. We wish to have another fun trip with him.

Great tour! Full of activities for making great memories! 🙌🏻 Our tour guide Thi Tommy was excellent. Very helpful and kind! 👍🏻

I have visited with the help of tripAdviser and they sent me mr Thi, a brilliant, engliah speaking and smart guy. He took us all the places accordingly and managed the trip without any hassle and pain. He is a good human being and professionally expert. I will look forwarded to have a trip with him and his agency agin. People can have help from here without hesitation.