vietnam

**oren** · #1 13 Oct 2005

Hi to all
I'm planing to cross the border from china to vietnam on the end of december .
My plan is to buy a motorbike and travel in north vietnam . I will try to continue with the same bike to lhaos .
I'm looking for partners to the ride , I would also like to get information about border crrosing with a motor bike .
thanks
oren

**pjmancktelow** · #2 25 Oct 2005

not sure how helpfull this will be but the last time i was in vietnam (backpacking rather than on two wheels im afraid) a few people i spoke with said to get a bike out of vietnam is difficult, only one guy i met had managed to buy a bike in cambodia and get it across into vietnam but it took him 4 days of border waiting. You can very easily rent a russian bike though especially in the area around Hue and Hoi An. Again not sure how helpful that was but it wont hurt.

**benjamminshaw** · #3 26 Oct 2005

You can be sure it will be O.K to cross Vietnamese, Lao borders with a motorcycle. You may have to pay some kind of extra fee, but it can be done.

**Grant Johnson** · #4 26 Oct 2005

Benjamin Shaw is partly wrong on the Vietnamese border - it cannot currently be done with an over 250cc motorcycle, so that lets most travellers out.

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Grant Johnson

Seek, and ye shall find.
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One world, Two wheels.
www.HorizonsUnlimited.com

**tomforde** · #5 31 Oct 2005

Hi Mate, Check out www.gt-rider.com it has all the info you need. I spent nearly 12 months up there last year. With a good part of it riding with David from the web site, has travelled extensively throughout SE Asia. We could not get in to Vietnam and as far as China at the moment forget about it.

**wonky** · #6 31 Oct 2005

Hi Oren,
I've just left Vietnam after a month of nonsense. We eventually got our bikes into the country(TT600r's) but required a letter from the prime minister, a heap of cash and a mound of paperwork to do this.
While we were waiting for the papers to get sorted we hired some Minsks and went upto Sapa in the northwest for five days of incredible views and mountain roads.
December is the best time of year to be there.
You can't get anything bigger than 175cc's into Vietnam! I thought DT175s would be the best bikes to get there, but i only saw 1 in the whole country and i think that was imported by an ex-pat.
You can buy a Minsk for $500US brand new, ride it through the country and then sell it for $350 in Saigon. The other option is to hire($5 a day, including spares and some tools), we got ours from Nguyen Hung in Hanoi(0084 9351282, 0084 912214554(mob), 162 Tranh Quang Khai Str. in the old quarter)
Apparently Nguyen's brother does the same thing in Saigon so you can hire in Hanoi and ride all the way down to Saigon and dump it with him. Check it out with him though.
If you contact Mr.Dan at Highway4 restaurant/Explore Indochina (www.highway4.com , www.exploreindochina.com), he could give you some other good contacts and a route.
Everyone in the country seems to know how to fix a Minsk. The bearing on the finally drive of mine collapsed, a guy across the street saw me and within an hour had it fixed, he charged me $6 and apparently that was a rip-off!
Check out our weblog at http://moto-hike.blogspot.com for some pickies of our Minsk ride(click on Vietnam1 in the galleries link on the left)
Cambodia is a different matter and once you get there you could buy a bigger bike with 'Asia plates' on and ride around Thailand and Laos as well. Try Jim at Hotel California, Phnom Penh for better info on the situation here.
Have a good one......