Kimkim Trip Reviews for Laos

My trip to Chiang Mai and Laos went exactly as planned by Doris! Someone was waiting for me as I arrived in Chiang Mai, Luang Prabang, Paske, and Vientiane. All of my guides were courteous, spoke clear English, were knowledgeable, and friendly. My drivers all drove very safely in clean, well maintained vehicles. My favorites were 1) visiting the Elephant Sanctuary outside of Chiang Mai; 2) the Plain of Jars; 3) the scenic yet bumpy drive to/from the PoJ; 4) swimming & zipline at Xangvieng; 5) the many beautiful waterfalls near Paske.

An unforgettable visit!! Our guide was so knowledgeable and fun!!! We were sad to say goodbye!

The trip was terrific. All of the accommodations were excellent. My only criticism is that Ashley wasn't available for long stretches. At one point I had to reach out to the emergency contact. In my previous Kimkim trips my travel planner was always available to respond to my questions m

Hotel Review

Aira Hotel Bangkok

Bangkok

I stayed at the Aira Hotel Bangkok, which was nice, but a more conventional hotel than the other places we stayed.

Activity Review

Full day Khao Yai National Park tour with lunch

Bangkok

The full day Khao Yai National Park tour was a pleasant experience. We did a nice hike through the jungle but did not have the luck to see elephants, which was a bit disappointing. However, I understand that these are wild animals and sightings aren't guaranteed. In retrospect, it might have been nice to have the option to visit another park with possibly better opportunities to see elephants, but the one we visited was still enjoyable.

Tui, our guide, was amazing. He is such a warm and pleasant person to spend a week with. He is helpful, resourceful, insightful, intelligent, and fun. We had a wonderful experience and holiday and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. We would recommend this to many people. The trip worked like clockwork and was a great pleasure and we will look to do more holidays with Grasshopper. Tui should be commended for being a great guide. We had no incidents in the whole trip. The Sennali hotel was a poor experience with the noise from the speaker announcements at night. we suggest changing this hotel as it is not comfortable also.

Thank you for a wonderful holiday.

Overall, the trip was very good. There could have been a lot more communication about the daily itinerary and I wish that there had been more optionality provided for what was done each day. For example, when visiting the Elephant Sanctuary, there were several tour options that the sanctuary provided, but one of the tour was just selected for me without providing me an option (when I would have preferred to be on another tour). Also, I feel like many of the days ended the activities earlier than expected without any option to visit more sites or deviate from the itinerary. Overall, while the tour was great, I was expecting more for the money that I paid (even despite the fact that I realize I paid a premium for being a solo traveler).

Andy was phenomenal in some respects, especially when I was presented with a health issue. But again, some of my comments about the optionality of the trip and the communication could have applied. I think we could have come up with a more tailed trip for me if I had been provided more options and there had been more communication.