By John Powers
Jan/Feb-2001

Hanoi, Saigon, Phnom Penh, Angkor

Getting There

There are no direct flights from the United States to Vietnam or Cambodia. If you are traveling to Cambodia first, go through Bangkok, which has numerous flights every day to Phnom Penh and Siem Reap; if you are going to Vietnam first, the easiest gateway is probably Hong Kong. To travel between Saigon and Hanoi or Saigon and Cambodia, you will need to fly on Vietnam Airlines, which shouldn't scare you—it can be inefficient, but its fleet of planes is newer than that of many U.S. airlines.

Basics

Telephone Numbers: The country code for Vietnam is 84. The city code for Hanoi is 4 (within Vietnam, 04); for Saigon it's 8 (08 within the country). Cambodia's country code is 855. The code for Phnom Penh is 23; for Siem Reap (Angkor) it's 63.(023 and 063 from within Cambodia).
Local Time: Twelve hours ahead of EST.
Best Time To Visit: Hanoi, Saigon, and Cambodia all have different weather patterns. Hanoi has a very good climate, and though June through August can be quite hot, there's no truly bad time to visit. The city's at its best from October through December, though the weather tends to be good all the way until the Tet Festival in late January or early February. Saigon is probably most comfortable in the dry season, November to April. The ideal time to visit Cambodia is probably December and January, when the humidity is low.
Flying: Around 25 hours from either New York or Los Angeles. No U.S. carriers fly to Vietnam or Cambodia. To Vietnam: Air France, Cathay Pacific, Japan Airlines, KLM, Korean Air, Lufthansa, Singapore Airlines, Swissair, Thai Airways International, Vietnam Airlines. To Cambodia: Royal Air Cambodge, Singapore Airlines, Vietnam Airlines, Thai Airways International.
Car From Airport: Taxis are available, but as Vietnamese and Cambodian airports can be somewhat disorienting, arrange to be picked up by your hotel's shuttle or limousine service. The cost is usually around $15.
Car Rentals: None, but it is easy to hire a car and driver through all good hotels.
Taxis: Can be found outside nearly all hotels in Saigon, Hanoi, and Phnom Penh; they can also be hailed. The cars tend to be air-conditioned and safe, though local driving habits can be unnerving. Tipping is not expected but is received with gracious surprise.
Money: The Vietnamese currency is the dong and is currently exchanged at the astronomical rate of 14,362 to the U.S. dollar. The Cambodian unit is the riel and exchanges at nearly 4,000 to the dollar. You can withdraw Vietnamese dong at ATMs in Saigon and Hanoi, but you are advised to bring a couple of hundred dollars in U. S. currency, perhaps $50 in singles, for use on the streets. U. S. bills are accepted everywhere in both countries, and most places calculate your bill in both local and U. S. currency.
Restaurant Tipping: Is not expected, but it is encouraged and much appreciated. A dollar tip can be the equivalent of a full day's pay.
Reading Matter: The two classics on this part of the world are Graham Greene's 1955 novel "The Quiet American" and Norman Lewis' magisterial 1951 "A Dragon Apparent: Travels in Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam." The best recent journalistic works are "Dragon Ascending: Vietnam and the Vietnamese" (1996) and "Cambodia: Report from a Stricken Land" (1998) by New York Times reporter Henry Kamm. Jon Swain's "River of Time" is a touching, evocative memoir of one reporter's love affair with Indochina.
Guides: While a lively, open-minded guide can improve your trip to Indochina by 100 percent, a bad one can bore you to distraction by robotically telling you things you don't want to know. The hotels recommended here have superb guides (whose services run about $25 a day), but if you want to organize something yourself, the best option is Ann Tours, whose head offices are in Saigon (833-4356; fax 832-3866; http://www.anntours.com). In Angkor, I can't imagine a better guide than Mr. Thy Khieu (through Grand Hotel d'Angkor: 963-888; fax 963-168).
Visas: You need a visa to enter Vietnam. Frankly, most Vietnamese embassies tend to make this an unnecessarily annoying process. I recommend that you let your travel company handle this for you. If they can't arrange visas, they will connect you to a service that can. If you want to do it yourself, go through the Vietnam Embassy, 1233 20th Street NW, Suite 400, Washington, DC 20036; 202-861-0694; fax 202-861-1297; www.vietnamembassy-usa.org. You also need a visa for Cambodia, but you can buy one at either the Phnom Penh or Siem Reap airports. A tourist visa costs $20 and requires that you bring two passport-sized photos for the document. Information: The Embassy of Cambodia, 202-726-7742; www.embassy.org/cambodia.

Hanoi

Orientation

Hanoi is a city bejeweled with lakes. The prettiest of them, Hoan Kiem, lies at the very heart of the city, surrounded by the Old Quarter and the colonial French quarter, where you'll find the opera house, St. Joseph's Cathedral, and the classic Hotel Metropole. From here it's a quick taxi ride to the Dong Da District, home to the famous Temple of Literature, or the Ba Dinh District and the Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum. This is a more relaxed walking city than Saigon, although it has some of the same unnerving traffic. If you have doubts, enlist a driver to pedal you around in a cyclo—something every visitor to Vietnam should try at least once.

Hotels

HOTEL SOFITEL METROPOLE HANOI
This is the best and most atmospheric hotel in Hanoi, with its marvelous old wing and a perfectly fine new one. Service isn't up to that of the very best Asian hotels—The Oriental in Bangkok or The Peninsula in Hong Kong, say—but the staff is extraordinarily friendly and the concierge service supremely efficient. $140­$750. 15 Ngo Quyen Street; 826-6919; fax 826-6920; www.sofitel.com.

HILTON HANOI OPERA
The Metropole's only serious competition comes from this year-old hotel adjacent to the Hanoi Opera House. It's a fine piece of modern architecture tastefully designed to visually mesh with both the opera house and the surrounding neighborhood. While too new to exude much atmosphere, it nevertheless remains a first-rate international hotel. $220­$900. 1 Le Thanh Tong Street; 933-0500; fax 933-0530; www.hilton.com.

Restaurants

CHA CA LA VONG
A hundred-year-old Hanoi institution, this slightly ramshackle two-story restaurant in the Old Quarter serves only one dish—cha ca. You sit at a plain table and they bring a brazier to your table and begin frying boneless chunks of locally caught pike. As the pieces get cooked, you retrieve them with chopsticks, mix them with shredded rice noodle cake and herbs—scallions, dill and pungent basil--and moisten the whole with a gentle sweet sauce. That's all there is to it, and it's utterly delicious. Reservations advised. $12. 14 Cha Ca Street; 825-3929.

SEASONS OF HANOI
Located in a fine old colonial house and offering just a whiff of Art Deco, this is one high-end restaurant where you'll find prosperous Vietnamese as well as foreigners. The restaurant specializes in French-influenced Vietnamese cuisine from both the North and South. $20. 95B Quan Thanh Street; 843-5444.

THE PRESS CLUB
If you want to meet Western diplomats and businessmen—or if you're just eager for some familiar Western fare—this fashionable complex right behind the Hotel Metropole is the place. Downstairs is a bistro/deli that serves up soups, salads, burgers, and postmodern concoctions like tandoori chicken on pita with hummus and tzatziki. Upstairs is far pricier dining—steaks and rack of lamb, Vietnamese dishes, and a surprisingly good wine list. Lunch, $15; dinner, $50. 59A Ly Thai To Street; 934-0888.

SPICES GARDEN
While every other international hotel believes that tourists don't want Vietnamese cuisine, the Metropole's French-born chef, Didier Corlou, has a Vietnamese wife and a commitment to local food. He has turned this restaurant into a showcase for street specialties like bun cha, the delicious grilled pork dish usually sold by small stalls on the street, and banh cuon, tiny steamed rice rolls filled with mushrooms and pork. $50. 15 Ngo Quyen Street; 826-6919.

HOA SUA
A terrific spot for an open-air lunch (Sunday brunch is packed), Ho Sua is equally famous for its solid French cooking and its socially conscious underpinnings. It trains needy street kids for careers in the culinary arts and has already produced several hundred chefs. Lunch, $12. $ 81 Tho Nhuom Street; 942-4448.

Shopping

SONG
This elegant boutique in the heart of the French quarter offers Hanoi's loveliest embroidery—exquisite quilts, tablecloths, and cushion covers. 5-7 Nha Tho Street; 828-6965; fax 511-0278.

KHAI SILK
With a boutique in the Old Quarter and another inside the Metropole, this is the place for silks. Look carefully and you will also find gorgeous scarves and handsome shirts. 96 Hang Gai Street, 825-4237; the Hotel Metropole, 826-3968.

Sights

VAN MIEU, THE TEMPLE OF LITERATURE
Built in 1070 by Emperor Ly Thanh Tong, this monument to Confucius soon became Vietnam's first university, training the sons of the mandarinate to pass the insanely rigorous civil service exams (sometimes only one in hundreds would pass) and become mandarin bureaucrats themselves. The Van Mieu itself is almost a physical embodiment of classic Confucian ideas, with the central path —metaphorically the Middle Way championed by Confucius—dividing the complex perfectly in half. Quoc Tu Giam Street; 845-2917. Open 8:30 a.m.­4 p.m.

OLD QUARTER
Just north of Hoan Kiem Lake lies this thousand-year-old commercial area known as the "36 streets," though there are actually more than 60. The various craft guilds divided the streets up over 800 years ago, and today these divisions still hold.

HANOI OPERA HOUSE
Built by the French to emulate the Palais Garnier in Paris, this lovely 1911 building is probably the most dazzling piece of colonial architecture in the city. Trang Tien Street.

HO CHI MINH MEMORIALS
Ho Chi Minh was, among other things, the father of Vietnamese independence. And Hanoi has honored him with many memorials. My favorite is the Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum, where Ho's embalmed body lies in state. This a place that is taken very seriously: Tourists must dress properly, not take photos, and behave as they would at any reverential site. The Ho Chi Minh Residence is the austere stilt house, built in the style of ethnic minorities, where Ho supposedly spent much of his time from 1958 until his death in 1969. Both the residence and the mausoleum are open Tuesday through Thursday from 8 to 11 a.m. and on weekends. Note: The mausoleum closes for three months each year (usually from September through November) so that Ho's body can have a tune-up.

MUSEUM OF ETHNOLOGY
In a quiet corner of the Cau Giay District, about a 20-minute taxi ride west of the city center, lies perhaps the most modern museum in all of Hanoi. Designed in conjunction with the Musée de l'Homme in Paris, it's dedicated to recording and displaying the artifacts of Vietnam's tribal minorities. D Nguyen Van Huyen Street. Open Tuesday-Sunday, 8:30 a.m.-12:30 p.m. and 1:30-4:30 p.m.

THE HANOI HILTON
They've flattened the notorious Hoa Lo Prison, where the North Vietnamese held and tortured the likes of John McCain and Douglas "Pete" Peterson (who would later become America's first ambassador to Vietnam). It's been replaced by a twin-tower high-rise that's having some trouble renting out, partly because the site doesn't exactly exude good karma. What's left is a tiny section of the old prison, which has been converted into a museum. 1 Hoa Lo Street. Tuesday-Sunday, 8:30­11:00 a.m.and 1:30-4:00 p.m.

HA LONG BAY
It's a three-hour drive to this astonishing array of 3,000 islands in the Gulf of Tonkin. Once you're on water, you'll understand why the U.N. has declared this an international heritage site: It's beautiful. Many Hanoi tour organizers run daily trips to Ha Long Bay, but I'd recommend setting things up either through your hotel or your tour operator back in the United States. I arranged my trip through the Metropole and got a car and driver, a knowledgeable guide, the exclusive use of a 20-passenger boat (including an on-board chef who cooked me a four-course seafood lunch, which I ate as we scudded between the ravishing islets). All for an astonishing $175.

Saigon

Orientation

Saigon is a sprawling city divided into 12 urban districts (quan) and six suburban districts (huyen). Nearly all tourists stay in District 1, the center of old Saigon, which starts on the west bank of the Saigon River. Here you will find the fine French colonial buildings, Vietnam War landmarks and museums, and nearly all the best hotels and restaurants. Many of the city's main attractions are either on Dong Khoi Street or within a few hundred yards of it. The one great exception is Saigon's Chinatown, Cholon (which means "big market"), not only the most bustling area in a city that never stops bustling, but also a quarter that features many of the city's finest temples.

When people first arrive in Saigon, they are often daunted by the local traffic. In fact, walking is safe, especially in the Dong Khoi area--but do watch your wallet and purse! If the erratic driving patterns make you uneasy, there are other ways to get around. Or book a car and driver through your hotel, take one of the countless cheap taxis, or climb onto a cyclo and be pedaled around by an amiable man in a cap.

Hotels

CARAVELLE HOTEL
Across from the Municipal Theater (more commonly known as the opera house), this hotel boasts one of the prime locations in Saigon, which is why it was a favorite of foreign correspondents during the war. The original ten floors have been recently renovated and a new 24-floor tower added; though the rooms feel a bit generic, they are comfortable and nicely appointed. The Signature Superior and the Signature Deluxe rooms are far better than the standard rooms. $120­$800. 19 Lam Son Square; 823-4999; fax 824-3999; www.caravellehotel.com.

CONTINENTAL HOTEL
A majestic old colonial building with oodles of character, this should be the great hotel in Saigon—Graham Greene's The Quiet American is partly set here. It has spacious rooms with wonderfully high ceilings and a marvelous central courtyard filled with frangipanis. Unfortunately, the government tourist bureau has tried to run it on the cheap, so the furnishings don't live up to the rooms, and the service can't match that of the best privately run hotels. Still, if you're prepared to sacrifice a bit of comfort for a compelling sense of old Vietnam, this is the place to stay. The very best room in the house is Suite 128, overlooking the Continental's courtyard. $100­$160. 132­134 Dong Khoi Street; 829-9201; fax 824-1772.

RENAISSANCE RIVERSIDE HOTEL SAIGON
Overlooking the Saigon River, this 21-story hotel offers perhaps the purest refuge from Saigon's manic energy that you'll find in the city. It's not an architectural masterpiece (its style is big-atrium international), but from the hotel's top floors, you get an absolutely extraordinary view of the river and the flat landscape that stretches to the east for miles and miles. The best rooms at the Renaissance are situated on what they call the Club floors, which also have much better service and a separate lounge area for breakfast and cocktails. $75-$150. 8-15 Ton Duc Thang Street; 822-0033; fax 823-5666; www.renaissancehotels.com.

Restaurants

VIETNAM HOUSE
Popular with expats and travelers alike, this is a good place to ease your way into Vietnamese cooking. $15. 93-95 Dong Khoi Street; 829-1623.

CAMARGUE
Trendy and expensive, this East-West restaurant is set in a restored old villa and features a good bar, billiards table, and open-air terrace. The food is the best that I encountered in Saigon. The wine list is quite good for Vietnam. Reservations essential. $30. 16 Cao Ba Quat Street; 823-3148.

MANDARIN
Rumor had it this was Saigon's best restaurant, and when I first saw it--a pretty little villa with nicely laid tables, I was ready to believe it. I began with a delicious appetizer ofVietnamese ceviche, thinly-sliced raw fish drizzled with lime juice and sesame. But after that high point, the food was inexcusably inept for a restaurant of this level of ambition—it's not easy to get duck quite so dried out. To be fair, the service was excellent, the wine list respectable, and the atmosphere exceedingly pleasant. Perhaps I was just unlucky. Reservations essential. $35. 11A Ngo Van Nam Street; 822-9783.

RESTAURANT 13
Most of the restaurants in the city center are now geared to tourists, but here the clientele is middle-class Vietnamese, and while the cooking isn't highly refined, basic dishes like lemongrass chicken and pork hotpot have the rich heartiness of traditional fare. $15. 11-17 Ngo Duc Ke Street; 829-1417.

Shopping

NGA
Saigon is filled with stores selling local handicrafts, but most of them, frankly, are terrible. Not so this small shop on the city's best shopping street, Le Thanh Ton: elegant wooden boxes and gorgeous lacquerware. 61 Le Thanh Ton Street, 825-6289.

SONG
This is the Saigon arm of the superb boutique that also has shops in Hanoi and Melbourne. 41 Dong Khoi Street; 823-8989.

Sights

DONG KHOI STREET
This was the heart of French colonial Saigon and boasts the cream of its colonial buildings. There's the Hotel Majestic, the Continental Hotel, the stately opera house, the General Post Office (just off Dong Khoi), whose facade has elaborate cornices, and Notre Dame Cathedral, a red-brick structure with two spires.

REUNIFICATION HALL
Originally called the Presidential Palace, this mid-1960s building was home to South Vietnam's various wartime presidents. Not a great piece of architecture, but outside is the tank that crashed through the front gates, marking the end of the war. 106 Nguyen Du Street. Open 7:30­10:30 a.m. and 1­3:30 p.m.

REX HOTEL ROOFTOP BAR
This is probably the best place in the city to have a drink and watch the twilight descend. That is what correspondents did during the war after hearing the official U.S. press briefings (known as the "five o'clock follies"). 141 Nguyen Hue Boulevard.

BEN THANH MARKET
This market has fruits and vegetables you've never seen before. Go early, when you're most likely to find cobras for sale. At the circular intersection of Pham Ngu Lao Street and Le Loi and Ham Nghi boulevards. Open 7 a.m. to 7 p.m.

EMPEROR OF JADE PAGODA
Built by the Cantonese community 90 years ago, this may be the finest of Saigon's Chinese pagodas. 73 Mai Thi Luu Street.

CHOLON
The Chinatown of Saigon, it began as a completely distinct city but was swallowed up by urban expansion. During French colonial days, Cholon was favored because of the Chinese gift for commerce; after the Communists took over, it fell out of favor for the same reason. Today it's almost overwhelmed by what Norman Lewis called "the turbulent processes of living." Divide your time between visiting its colorful side streets and its pagodas, especially the spectacularly ornamented Thien Hau Pagoda at 710 Nguyen Trai Street.

CU CHI
About a 45-minute drive from the downtown hotels, this 130-mile network of tunnels is one of the great tourist attractions left by the war. Begun by Viet Minh rebels when they were fighting the French, the tunnels were greatly expanded during the war with the United States. The place is an entire underground city complete with eating and sleeping quarters, schools, hospitals, and a command HQ. You're allowed to travel through the tunnels, but many find them claustrophobic. A taxi will take you there and back for around $25, or you can ask your hotel to book you a car.

Phnom Penh

Orientation

Built at the meeting point of three rivers (Tonle Sap, Bassac, and Mekong), Phnom Penh is a city of wide French boulevards and narrow side streets. Nearly all the action takes place in the city center, which is roughly bordered by the Wat Phnom temple, Independence Monument, and Monivong Boulevard. Taxis are readily available, but it's cheaper and more comfortable to book a car through your hotel.

Hotels

HOTEL LE ROYAL
Penh's top hotel is where the top diplomats and CEOs stay. A vintage colonial building bedecked with palms and painted a cheering yellow, it has been restored by the Raffles group with its customary attention to detail. It has a gym, a spa, a seductive courtyard swimming pool, some of the city's best restaurants, and perhaps the definitive watering hole, the Elephant Bar. Rooms $290-$1,300. 92 Rukhak Vithei (just off Monivong Boulevard); 981-888; fax 981-168; www.raffles.com.

FOREIGN CORRESPONDENTS CLUB
In a city that, frankly, has no great restaurants (the best cooking is done in the hotels), this cultural landmark is a must-see. It's steeped in the trappings of old Phnom Penh (ceiling fans, gracious service, skittering geckos on the walls) and offers a fabulous view over the Tonle Sap River in one direction, the National Museum in the other. The food itself is so-so, a chichi melange of international dishes, but it really doesn't matter. Lunch, $20. 363 Sisowath Quay; 427-757.

Shopping

LOTUS ARTS DE VIVRE
A chain of boutiques owned by Rolf von Bueren and his Thai wife, Helen, Lotus specializes in exquisite handcrafted luxury goods: antique textiles, exotic carpets, hugely expensive chess sets, rattan purses with diamond-and-emerald clasps, remarkable jewelry (such as a black-coral bangle with diamonds and emeralds). The priciest place to buy gifts in Cambodia, Lotus has two branches, one in the Hotel Le Royal, the other in the Grand Hotel d'Angkor; www.lotusartsdevivre.com.

Angkor

Orientation

The gateway to the temples, the provincial town of Siem Reap ("SEE-em REE-ep") is built on the banks of the narrow Siem Reap River, which flows north and south through the town. Although the influx of tourist money is leading the city to expand a bit too hastily, it remains a pleasantly dozy place, with a market where you can find cute knickknacks and so-so restaurants where you can escape the luxury travel cocoon. But the only real reason to come is the temples, four miles out of town.

Hotels

GRAND HOTEL D'ANGKOR
One of Asia's truly romantic hotels, this renovated yellow beauty with white balconies has the richness and character you expect from a great colonial hotel. The rooms are richly decorated in the country manner; the public areas offer the creature comforts you crave after a long day looking at temples: a first-class spa, a huge lap swimming pool, a library and map room. Though Café d'Angkor's lunch buffet is nothing special, Restaurant Le Grand serves up excellent dinners; chef Dickson Poon's riffs on Khmer dishes are actually far better than the rather coarse originals. The two sumptuous bungalows are everyone's fantasy of what life in the tropics could be like. $310­$1,900. 1 Vithei Charles de Gaulle; 963-888; fax 963-168; www.raffles.com.

SOFITEL ROYAL ANGKOR
Opened in the fall of 2000, this enormous, inventively landscaped hotel is a worthy competitor to the Grand Hotel in the luxury sweepstakes. Knowing that they cannot possibly match their rival's sense of heritage, the designers have blended French and Khmer architecture into a cleverly sustained, postmodern variation on the idea of Angkor. Though the hotel opened too late for me to stay there, I walked the grounds, admiring the spa, the landscaping, and the "free-form" pool. I visited the unfinished rooms: They offer splendid views of the countryside. $280­$1,500. Vithei Charles de Gaulle; 964-601; 964-611; www.sofitel.com.

About this Guide

Prices In U.S. dollars.
Hotel Rates High-season double occupancy, from the least expensive double room to the most expensive suite, exclusive of ten percent hotel tax.
Restaurants Tabs Dinner for two, excluding wine, unless otherwise indicated.
Telephone Numbers Only the local number is given. See Vietnam and Cambodia Basics.
Platinum Card Travel Service (PTS) or Centurion Travel Service (CTS)
For assistance with travel to Vietnam and Cambodia, or any other destination, call 800-443-7672 (PTS) or 877-877-0987 (CTS). From abroad, call 623-492-5000 collect.

Symbols

$ Establishment accepts no charge/credit cards or accepts cards other than the American Express Card.

Disclaimer: the information in this story was accurate at the time of publication in January 2001, but we suggest you confirm all details with the service establishments before making travel plans.