Tamar got a round trip ticket to HCMC, Vietnam on Japan Airlines for $1,440 including taxes and the additional $70 for weekend travel (both ways) with only 1 stop over in Tokyo. This fare was on sale for a limited time and would normally cost over $1,800. The taxes alone are over $700, half the price of the entire ticket. FYI: Weekend travel is Friday to Monday and costs an extra $35 each way if travel begins on one of these days.

I tried to book my ticket for departure mid-January but no such luck…no yet. I’m wait listed on Korean Air and Happy tells me that I should be able to get a sale price on JAL about a month before my intended departure, Jan 17th. Otherwise my ticket would also cost over $1,800 and Happy just doesn’t want me to pay that! I’ll just have to wait until the middle of December for the sale to come around. However, availability may become a problem since it’s just before Tet and the Chinese New Year (Jan 26, 2009).

Wa Minh Travel arranges visas for Vietnam (or anywhere else) for about $60 extra but they can’t procure multi-entry visas spanning more than a month which is what Tamar and I both need for this trip. For that you must apply directly with the Vietnamese embassy which never lists prices on their website and they have really limited phone hours.

We’re still up several hundred bucks from the $1050 round trip with Korean Air that I got in 2006 (including the visa) but international travel is just really pricey these days. Fortunately, the pho in the street is hot, delicious and still costs under a dollar!

Three weeks minus one day to go, almost in Hanoi already! This time we are going to start our 5 week journey exactly where I last finished-Hanoi, Vietnam. In Sep 2001, after 6 wonderful weeks of traveling through Thailand and Vietnam, I left Hanoi to go back home to Tel Aviv as school was about to start. Little did I know that within a week all universities around the country will be on strike and I will be sitting at home wishing I could roam the streets of Hanoi.

On Fri we picked up our plane tickets which raised the excitement level yet a bit higher. We have a hotel reservation for Hanoi and can almost taste the pho already!

In December 2006 I found a fare for $1065 r/t to Ho Chi Minh City from JFK, through Seoul, including taxes and the visa to Vietnam. Most fares were $1,300 and up on the Internet. Now, almost a year later, taxes have gone up and there’s apparently a new surcharge for fuel and security which has raised the prices about $300. In addition we’re flying just before Christmas which is a popular time for people to go to Vietnam so the demand is high. This time the tickets cost $1550 (taxes/visa included) but I haven’t found anything on the Web for less than $1700 for the same dates and travel time.

So, if you’re booking your next trip to SE Asia and are having trouble with fares on the Internet, visit:

Wa Minh Travel, 223 Grand Street, Room 101, New York, NY 10013

Wa Minh Travel on a Map