🇳🇱 Amsterdam → 🇻🇳 Ho Chi Minh City · 2 weeks

Eat bun bo hue (spicy Hue-style beef noodle soup) at a street stall on Nguyen Trai Street in District 5 before 9am — this is working-class breakfast in its purest form, under €1.50, and far more interesting than pho.

Book a motorbike street food tour for your first evening — local guides take you on the back of their bikes to 6-8 spots across the city that you'd never find alone. XO Tours and Xe Om Tours are reputable operators.

Visit Cu Chi Tunnels on a weekday morning (arrive before 9am) and skip the standard tour — hire a local guide privately at the site to access the extended tunnel section where you actually crawl through 70-metre passages.

Drink egg coffee at a Ca Phe Trung café in the backstreets of District 3 — the original version uses robusta coffee topped with whipped egg yolk and condensed milk, best sipped sitting on a low plastic stool at the pavement.