Four packages, one inclusions table

All four start the same way: a pick-up at your hotel in central Ho Chi Minh City and the expressway south across the Tien River. The Can Tho block is in every package because Cai Rang floating market only makes sense with a night in Can Tho: the market is at its liveliest between about 06:00 and 07:30, and a day trip from Ho Chi Minh City cannot reach it in that window.

The three-day package adds An Binh islet on the way in and Chau Doc, near the Cambodian border, for Sam Mountain in the late afternoon and the Tra Su melaleuca forest when it opens at 06:30. The four-day package adds a first morning on the islets off My Tho, a second night in Can Tho for the old Binh Thuy house, and a stop at the Sa Dec flower village on the way west. The six-day package carries on from Chau Doc to Ha Tien on the Gulf of Thailand, crosses to Phu Quoc on the public fast boat and ends with two nights on the island.

The longer packages do not just add days. They change the shape of the drive. The two-day package puts about seven hours of road into two days, in two blocks. The four-day package spends more hours in the car in total but breaks them up: the first day stops on the islets off My Tho halfway to Can Tho, and the third day stops at Sa Dec halfway between Can Tho and Chau Doc. Only the last day, the run back from Chau Doc, is one long drive. The six-day package never drives back at all.

• The standard inclusions table, word for word: hotel nights with breakfast, private car and driver, an English-speaking guide, the named boat trips, the named entrance tickets, the named lunches and water
• Pick-up from a hotel in central Ho Chi Minh City, normally at 07:30
• A choice of three hotel levels for the same route, with no other change to the package
• No shopping stops. If a workshop sells what it makes, as the rice-noodle and coconut-candy workshops do, buying is your choice and nothing is added to your price

The full table and the reasons behind each line are on what all-inclusive means. The places themselves are described on the destination pages.

The route and the order of the days stay as written. We can move your drop-off to the airport, change a double to two twins, swap a shared boat for a private one or put you in a different hotel level in one town. We do not add a town, drop one, or swap the six-day package's Ha Tien crossing for a flight. Those changes turn a package into a custom route, and a custom route cannot be compared line by line with anything.