Safety gear
Contents
Choosing what motorbike gear to bring or what to buy can be extremely difficult. Tigit has a full-blown accessory store over at www.chrunix.com, where we sell cheap gear to the very expensive. You can order directly on the website, click “store pickup,” and choose your starting location. There is no need to pay in advance.
When it comes to bringing your own gear, we recommend bringing as much as possible. Clothes can be packed inside a helmet and boots, and with good packing and the correct gear, your suitcase shouldn’t go above 22kg. This will go on any international flight.
When it comes to owning your own gear, where most people go wrong is using “ADV” gear, which generally, if going with mainstream brands, tends to be too hot for a country like Vietnam.
It is a complicated topic, and we have a few articles and videos on youtube that explain. I suggest reading this article about “what to bring and wear”
Packing as light as possible
Following on from safety gear is the idea of packing as light as possible. Travelers always overpack, and you don’t want to be a motorcyclist with side boxes and top boxes full to the maximum. This concept might look great on Instagram ADV pictures, but in reality, it is unnecessary and disastrous for motorbike performance. If you are doing a motorbike tour with Tigit, our guides will force you to strip everything out of your bags, especially when offroading.
Tigit has a service that can be selected when booking a motorbike to ship your bag from one city to another. You can also store bags at our offices for free.
Sorting out a sim card
Esims are an option these days, but sim cards can also be bought in the immigration line at international airports. Internet is everywhere in Vietnam and very cheap. It costs around 10usd for basically unlimited internet. The main providers are Viettel and Mobi. Most people go with Viettel, but in the end, it doesn’t matter much. We have an article that goes deeper into this topic here.
Preparing documents such as licenses and visas
Visas for Vietnam are different for every country, so we can not advise you here. Check your visa requirements carefully and get them sorted early. It is relatively common for Tigit to have cancellations due to Visa’s getting delayed.
When it comes to motorbike licenses, we have a full article that explains the topic. Please listen to the audio and read the article in detail.
General advice on choosing a motorbike
Choosing a motorbike can be hard, and we have videos and text on all the models we provide. The main thing to understand here is that power is not important. A 110cc Honda Blade can carry two people and luggage over any mountain you can throw at it.
The real factors to consider are comfort, price, and reliability. Tigit chooses a select few models within each market segment to try and make life easy. We don’t have hundreds of models to choose from. There should be a motorbike that fits your needs; just watch the videos!
Internal transport, taxi, flight, buses and trains
Taxi
In Vietnam, we use an app called “grab”; this is basically Uber. I recommend downloading it and setting it up before arriving.
Buses
If you are renting a motorbike, there is almost no scenario that you will be needing to use a bus.
Trains
Read our full article on trains, but to summarize, it is basically impossible to send a bike on the train with you. Bikes can go on trains, but they go separately, meaning if you use the train, you normally send it back to Tigit, and your rental is over.
When it comes to trains for personal use (for example, if you want to take a train “for fun”), well, in my opinion, there is no benefit to this. They are slow and not particularly comfortable or cost-efficient.
Flights
Vietnam has two major airlines, VietnamAirlines and Vietjet. Flights are very cheap, quick and efficient. I either drive or fly everywhere. I haven’t used a bus or train in over ten years!
In general, I like to use Vietjet as they are cheaper. However, Vietnam Airlines supposedly has better service, and they provide meals and water. Overall, though, flights are cheap, and airports are small and quick to use.
Booking hotels in advance
We have a video on this topic that explains it in great detail. But in general, I tend to search for my hotel at lunchtime. I then book for the same evening. I recommend against booking an entire trip in advance. Things never go to plan on motorbike holidays!
I use agoda, but booking.com is also fine.
It is worth keeping an eye out for big Vietnamese holidays. If you find your dates are on a Vietnamese holiday then you will need to book in advance.
Technology is key
Vietnam runs on smartphones. There is no such thing as paper maps; wifi is everywhere, and every generation in Vietnam can use a smartphone. From the two-year-old up to the 90-year-old, they all have phones.
Read our article on downloading maps and getting your phone setup.
Smartphone addiction is actually a major problem in Vietnam, and you will notice even in poverty-stricken areas, children have YouTube open. For tourists, this means you must have a phone that works and internet access.
Navigation through googlemaps, maps.me, Google translation live and for menus, and hotel bookings. It is extremely difficult to travel to Vietnam without a phone!
I recommend against Iphones, because they tend to break with vibrations when mounted to a motorbike. They are often SIM card-locked, and they also don’t work very well with mapping apps.
Android is king for motobiking; if you don’t have one, then Tigit sells Android phones for under 100usd that you can buy onsite. We have all our maps loaded onto them as well!
