Delta Adventure Tours - beware
November 17, 2007
I would like to warn other travellers about Delta Adventure Tours so this company cannot continue to decieve unwary tourists. Myself and 2 friends booked the”Mostly by Boat - Express Way to Cambodia” trip from Saigon to Phnom Penh. We paid $40USD for the speed boat option.
In there advertising flyer this option was 2hr 45minutes by boat from Chau Doc arriving in Phnom Penh at 1pm. Our boat took 6hours and arrived at 4pm. We spoke to a tour guide from another company on the boat and he said there was not another boat and this was the time it always took to get to Phnom Penh. We could have paid about half the price and arrived at the same time!!
The flyer also says that we would visit a local orchard and village – this didn’t happen either. We were also told we would stop in Vinh Long City – yes 5 minutes for a restroom break.
The bus was overcrowded from Vinh Long City – the guide had to buy a stool for someone to sit on because there were not enough seats. When we told the guide that it was too crowded he laughed at us (very professional fellow - Mr Phuong.) On the boat to Chau Doc – the guide (Mr Phuong) sat downstairs with his mates and we all sat upstairs – he didn’t come near us other than to tell us we could buy soup on the boat if we wished. He gave us no information on what we were seeing and wasn’t available to answer any questions for us either.
When we arrived in Chau Doc no one seemed to know where we were going the next day. Overall it was a very disappointing finish to our trip to Vietnam as we were overcharged and badly deceived.
Don’t use Delta Adventure Tours - they are giving the legitimate companies a bad name.
Reported by Deb13 at Thorn Tree World
What was your experience, comment please.!
Spread the Word
I agree completely with the warning about Delta Adventure Tours. We detail our experience on our website. They told us they could book us a one-way trip to Can Tho, but we ended up joining other daytrippers on the way to a Mekong Delta tour! When they arrived at their first stop, we were told that we would have to wait three hours until they finished before we could proceed, and when we protested, they said we should go on a local bus instead when we’d clearly paid extra to go in an airconditioned, safe bus. We ended up arguing with the tour guide and, later down the line, arguing with three people at the Delta office before they finally relented and we got taken to our destination. Horrendous! We also had no choice but to use them to go to Cambodia on a slow boat to Phnom Penh. Ended up having to wait 2 hours on the boat, until the tour group we had to join had finished their little river tour. Avoid, avoid, avoid.
We did a good experience with Footprint Travel to Mekong, now also having a good time in the North.
You might like to check with them before you travel to Mekong
Happy travel!
John
Delta Adventure Tours is a nightmare: Violent and Dishonest!
We went on a tour of the Mekong and first, they left us in the middle of nowhere for an hour without telling us anything so they could go pick up more customers. I mean really THE MIDDLE OF NOWHERE (they told us to get out to go to the bathroom and then they just drove off). But that was really the least worst thing that happened. The tour guide proceeded to scream at the top of his lungs at some Japanese girl because she asked to see her receipt. At first we were like, maybe the girl is being a jerk and the poor guy has had it up to here with annoying tourists. We were totally wrong. At the end of the tour, he took us to the side and demanded more money. We showed his our PAID receipt and he said that he wanted 16 more dollars. We refused mainly on principle, since he was now screaming at us. We kept showing him the stamp saying PAID on our receipt but he said that since it was Tet, we had to pay more. Then, he starts trying to hit my husband, grabbing him by the shirt and neck and swinging at him. I get in the way, saying “leave him alone!” and he starts to swing at me. Some people surround us and thankfully someone calls the police. The police arrive and first the tour guide tells them all these lies in Vietnamese. Finally an English speaker and we explain the situation and show him the receipt at which point the police tell us we can go.
I took a trip to Chau Doc and back with Delta Adventure tours, including a night stop in a village en-route. They also arranged a ’side trip’ for two days from Chau Doc.
I found the booking staff, guides and boat staff to be excellent, friendly and helpful. They were also by far the cheapest that I found. I suppose that as with any trip and any company, ‘your mileage may vary’.
I personally would (and have) happily recommend Delta to my friends.
UK based, no affiliation with Delta btw.
why the comment is totally different between steven & Jasoni…
l plan go to vietnam from phom pheh…
any recomendation for this delta trip???
i took a 3D2N trip to mekong on dec 08 delta tour package. i like the tour guide a lot. Although he said that he just joined delta adventure for a few months and he move from north to south vietnam, i was surprised that he’s very thorough and knowledgeable. He’s also very engaging and cool guy who know what are the places to eat, shop and stay around. I cant rem his name and i just know his age is about 26yo. Young but talent.
I will definately recommend this to everyone. If anyone know this tour guide name, let me know. So that next time when i return to vietnam or i will inform my friend to look for this tour guide. BRAVO!!!
My husband and I decided to take their one day Mekong trip. There were 2 options a $10- per person trip or the one we opted for, $14- per person. Their brochure described a tour of the floating market, exotic fruits, a quick bike tour. We ended up 5.5 hours on cramped buses. There was no market as it kicks in early in the morning. The bikes were practically unrideable from rust and the tour guide, although well intentioned, was fairly repetitive. When we returned, I explained my issues with the company manager directly and his response was essentially “we know it’s poor but what do you want for $14?”. Slightly dumbfounding. I explained that I was happy to pay more for a quality experience but there is a minimum expectation to be met. Most of all, I was trying to give them feedback because it is possible there is a communication breakdown from office to field. I’ve done large and small tours around the world and this bar none was the absolute worst and strangest. It is a potentially great tour that is horribly executed.
i have not been with delta but went on tour with buffalo tours and the guide Crista was any think but professional she sleep in the fount seat most of the time (hung over ) from out on the town the air port was rained out at nah Tran leg of trip but that can happen so she said well continue buy bus to hoi an 9 hrs i asked if we could go buy train as more room the answer the train tracks are all flooded out and not running so we (14 people on a small bus with bags 14 hrs latter we arrived and all the trains wear in service several mornings we wear given eggs and bread for breakfast all this coast me $1.300.00 dollars aus i now travel under my own steam and suggest to any one look for other tour groups to travel with.
We travelled with Delta Adventures Ho Chi Minh, to Mekong Delta for 2 days in februari 2010 and we are so satisfied. We have no complaint, we did the order from Sweden 3 week before and get answer at once. We had a nice guy, Than (Nova) , as guide, and he was very clever. We did also a tour to Cu Chi tunnels and we are very pleased with that tour too, We found out that Delta Adventures in Ho Chi Minh is a very serious tourmaker and cheap as well.
Mekong Delta tour NOT to use
I recently returned from Vietnam (Feb 2010). I have been waiting over 4 weeks for a promised response from the Delta Adventure Tour Company in HCMC. Since I have had no email contact from them, I am now writing this scathing report about their service.
I am writing a travel book for solo travelers to Thailand, Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam. I was told on Feb 1, 2010 before leaving HCMC and Kim, the manager of Delta Adventure Tours, in my hotel lobby (the Asian Ruby Hotel in HCMC), that she offered me a full refund , after talking to the owner. She sent over a $20 bill later that afternoon.
I have received no refund via her sister in Seattle, WA. I live in the US.
Kim said that she was shocked at the details I gave her about how horrible the 3 day 2 night trip was for me and others to the Mekong Delta. So many fellow tour companions were disgusted and outraged and said that this rotten experience would leave them with a bad taste in their mouth for Vietnam. I told Kim, that the hotel’s written description of the tour was not the reality at all. Some of the things they spoke about in glowing terms just did not materialize, or were simply “set ups” for duping the tourists and not real operating candy factories, fish farms,etc.
It was fraud.
Besides telling Kim that I was angry about being lied to repeatedly by her 2 guides, while on the tour, I also expressed my disgust at watching one guide screaming at one member of our tour group ( a 69 yr old woman). What happened to Vietnamese respect and “losing face”.? In addition this same guide yelled at a couple whom he picked up mid trip in Chau Doc, took money from them to deliver them by boat to Can Tho, crammed them and their large backpacks into our small minivan ( which only had seating for the already paid customers forcing us to sit in jump seats),then forced them to get out of the minivan in a small town where the guide refused to continue on until they got out at a bus stop. People were angry at the guide for lying and the disrespectful treatment of these passengers who paid him. It was very unsettling for everyone and angered the group on the already ruined 3rd day of the trip.
Repeatedly, the guides would tell one customer one thing and then another would get totally different information when asked what we were doing next ,or where we were going, or how long the bus ride. We all compared our answers and were mad. When someone would confront the guide with the misinformation, he would make up still another answer and turn around and leave. They were both totally unprofessional, rude, lied, disrespectful and one seemed crazy while in his rage!
What other trip advisor tourists said ” negatively” about this company over the past years, I experienced too, and much more. There is so much more that has not even been mentioned. Sadly, this kind of “press” reflects badly for all of the tour operators in Vietnam. Why doesn’t peer pressure and peer review get them out of business? Why don’t the better hotels, like the Asian Ruby in Saigon stop using this tour operator? Are they all in agreement to “get what
money they can from the tourists, regardless of the means” ?
I know that this is not what Vietnam is like on a whole. I experienced the respect, kindness, generosity, happiness, and friendliness of the Vietnamese people for 4 weeks prior to the misadventure and disgust of the tour with the Delta Adventure Tour company.
I was on at the end of a 3 month trip, and was writing copious notes for my book. I wrote daily, and detailed the 3 day experiences on this trip, so that I could report the problems to Delta Adventure Tours. And I did.
I purchased the listed $42 3d/2n Mekong Delta tour with added on single supplement plus added on for 3 star hotels, totaling $98. Just another dishonest part of the trip. I stayed in 2 star, noisy, lousy hotels and experienced 3- 4 hr bus rides and very long waiting and doing nothing periods that were over 1 hr each.
At the beginning and ends of the tour while in the Delta, the company forces you to stay in the bus loading area to exchange people and buses as the company merged people again and again to make their tours more profitable for them. 3 day/2 day people went on one bus mixed with Cambodian drop offs, etc . They could care less if the customers were just standing around waiting for several hours altogether. We had no options to leave the bus loading area and were lied to about how long we would be waiting. It was disgusting to see their lack of respect for customers and their obvious greed.
Before even booking, I was also lied to when told that the tours were 14-15 persons, that ended up being 48 as the company crammed people on larger buses to make more money. I specifically said that I only wanted to be in a small group tour. I was lied to. We all felt like cattle standing and being forced to join other groups for very long bus rides around the delta. shocking! We spent more time on buses and waiting with nothing to do than on boats.
The Delta Adventure manager, Kim, who spoke to me in my hotel lobby following the trip, came because I complained to the Asian Ruby hotel staff that I felt cheated and that the tour was awful. She told me that the one guide was on probation and was to be fired. The other guide lied to us also and eliminated part of the tour and had us just sit at the “bus rendezvous area” for hours instead of taking us to a show and fruit sampling event..
I hope that this company is forced out of business by the good and honest Vietnamese people and also the lack of tourist support for their business.
me and my girlfriend just returned from 2 days trip to the mekohng with the same company and i have to say that it was really good. the bus was late a bit but you need to know that in vietnam they havbe their own time…:) but if you dont want to take this company you can always take another one … and they all around the same grade i think