Trang An Boat Tour 2023: A Beautiful Experience in Nature

In this travel guide, we share our experience and everything you need to know about the Trang An boat tour in Vietnam.

Take a moment to close your eyes and imagine yourself in a quiet and tranquil place. The only sound you hear are bamboo paddles working their way through a calm river. Everywhere you look, you see green; the color of nature. Thick green plants are covering big limestone cliffs that reflect into the riverbed, making even the river look green.

There are no land in sight – all you see is water, cliffs, and caves – so you have to stay in the boat, and just let yourself be part of this nature experience.

This is Trang An.

We absolutely love this place! So naturally, we’re dedicating this blog post to the Trang An boat tour and everything that comes with it.

We’ll start the blog post with some important information such as how to get there, opening hours, price, and routes on the Trang An boat tour. Then we’ll share our own personal highlights followed by a bunch of pictures from the trip. We hope you’ll enjoy this travel guide to the famous Trang An Boat Tour.

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Trang An boat tour information

In this section, you’ll find all the practical information about the Trang An boat trip.

How to get to Trang An

From Ninh Binh and Tam Coc

The Trang An boat tour is approximately 8 kilometers away from both Ninh Binh and Tam Coc.

So it’s super easy to rent a scooter or a bicycle and go there by yourself. Parking fee for motorbikes are 15.000 VND and parking fee for bicycles are 10.000 VND (notice these parking prices may have gone up).

For those who feel uncomfortable on two wheels, taxis are also an option.

From Hanoi

There are approximately 100 kilometers between Hanoi and Trang An, which makes the boat ride a perfect day trip. You can easily go here on a group tour if you don’t want to go by yourself: Day tour from Hanoi to Trang An, Mua Caves & Hoa Lu

Trang An boat tour opening hours

The Trang An boat tours are open from early morning to late afternoon: 7 AM – 4 PM.

Trang An boat tour ticket price

250.000 VND for adults.

Children may get a discounted ticket price, but it’s measured after height, not age. It’s just like going on a rollercoaster, except if you’re shorter than 1 meter then you get a discounted price and still get to go.

There are four seats in each boat. So if you are two people and you want to have a boat to yourself, you have to buy the remaining two seats. One boat alone will cost 1.000.000 VND.

Remember to bring a bit of extra cash to tip your boat guide. They row you around for hours in the hot sun for a very fair price! It’s not mandatory, but we still tipped our boat lady 50.000 VND as a thank you.

How long is the boat tour in Trang An?

The boat tour will last between 2,5 – 3 hours depending on which route you choose and how long you visit the temples around the Trang An landscape complex.

What to bring for the boat ride?

Water, snacks, a hat for the sun, a camera, and SPF 50 all the way!

You will be exposed to the sun during the whole tour except for when you sail through the grottoes in Trang An. So remember to bring a good sunscreen.

Some people bring an umbrella to cover themselves from the sun, but please don’t do that. Glenn and I were sharing a boat with another couple who was sitting in front of us. The first half of the boat ride we didn’t get to experience any of the beautiful scenery in Trang An. Damn umbrella was in the way.

Luckily, our boat guide was friendly enough to point out to the couple in front of us that we should switch seats halfway, so we also got some really great views on the way.

Trang An boat tour routes

There are 3 different boat tour routes in Trang An, and we’ve tried 2 of them. They all offer something different, yet they are all very beautiful, so it’s not like you can choose wrong.

From what we’ve seen so far, this place is covered with caves, limestone cliffs and lily pads. So no matter which route you choose, you will experience the beautiful landscapes.

If you can’t decide on a boat tour, then ask yourself these questions:

• Do I want to go through as many caves as possible? Then route 1 is the best option.
• Do I want to take a faster route? Then route 2 is ideal.
• Do I prefer to spend most of the tour watching the scenery? Then go with route 3.

Now let’s dive into the 3 different routes and see what they offer.

Route 1 (9 caves & 3 temples)

Highlights: This is the boat tour in Trang An that offers the route with most grottoes. Make sure to look out for all the pretty stalactites when you go through the caves.

Our favorite temple on this route was the Den Tran temple, which is a small, beautiful stone carved temple that you can only reach by walking up the steps over a small hill.

Duration: Within 3 hours you will visit 9 caves and 3 temples.

In our opinion, this is the most adventurous boat tour in Trang An because of all the caves you go through. However, if you’re claustrophobic you might consider Route 2 or 3 where you will go through fewer caves.

Route 2 (4 caves & 3 temples)

Highlights: The Thanh Cao Son Temple is a gorgeous temple situated in the middle of the river in Trang An. You’ll also go past the film location where they shot King Kong Skull Island.

Duration: Within 2,5 hours you’ll visit 4 caves and 3 temples.

Route 2 is the shortest boat ride, so it’s a good fit for those who have less time to explore Trang An. Also, this is probably the best route for those who suffer from claustrophobia since the caves aren’t that long. The longest cave is Thanh Truot, which is 320 meters long.

Route 3 (3 caves & 3 temples)

Highlights: The Dot cave (Hang Dot) is supposedly the longest of all the grottoes in Trang An. The Dot cave is 1000 meters long and has a lot of beautiful stalactites.

Duration: Within 3 hours you’ll visit 3 caves and 3 temples.

This is the route to take if you prefer to go through less caves and instead spend more time watching the beautiful scenery in Trang An. It’s also the route for those who want to experience going through a very long cave.

Reasons to go on the Trang An boat tour

Here are the top 3 reasons why you should visit this fantastic place in Vietnam – and why we will be coming back in the future for more boat rides in Trang An.

As mentioned earlier, we’ve been on the Trang An boat tour twice during our trips to Vietnam.

Once in September and once in November. On our first tour in September, we went on Route 2. And on our second time in November, we went on Route 1. Since we’ve never been on route 3, we can’t comment on our experience with this boat ride in Trang An.

1. Landscapes in Trang An

The landscapes in Trang An are what people come for. It’s also what we came for in the first place.

Since 2014, the landscapes in Trang An has been inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage site. That says a lot about how beautiful the scenery is.

During the boat trips on Route 1 and Route 2, we saw some of the most incredible rock formations we’ve ever seen. Trang An is known for its many limestone cliffs, and they surely didn’t disappoint!

The boat ride gives you the opportunity to completely immerse yourself in Trang An’s landscape. It feels like you’re a part of it – like you’re actually playing a part in nature. For me, that feeling was amazing.

So in both Route 1 and 2, you will get amazing scenery, and the same will count for Route 3 since the landscape is the main reason for visiting Trang An in the first place.

2. Trang An grottoes

We definitely preferred Route 1 to Route 2.

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think you can choose a wrong or an ugly route, but I must admit that we did have a favorite.

The reason why we both loved Route 1 was because of all the caves you sail through.

The Trang An Grottoes are small caves that lead through the limestone cliffs, and some of these caves are hundreds of meters long. Rowing through the grottoes in Trang An was definitely one of our travel highlights in Vietnam!

It’s pretty adventurous to pass through all these caves. Now, I’m a nervous person by nature, so I was obviously a bit anxious every time we entered a new cave. But to my surprise, I actually found the whole experience very peaceful.

All we could hear in the caves were the sound of our guide silently rowing the paddles through the river while stalactites full of minerals were dripping from the cave ceiling.

The grottoes in Trang An are just amazing.

On our next trip to Trang An, we want to do the final boat tour – Route 3. And we honestly can’t wait to pass through the 1 kilometer long Dot cave.

3. Ecotourism

Apart from all the beauty that surrounds you, one of the best things about the Trang An boat ride is that you leave no footprint behind. Literally… You sit in a boat most of the time.

If you’re searching for the boat tour’s starting point on Google, just type in, “Trang An Ecotourism Zone Management”. I love that they use the expression, “eco-tourism”.

Even though it’s a very touristic place in Vietnam, it’s fortunately not ruined by humans.

The boats don’t have any motors. So the only fuel that moves you down the river is manpower, which means that the river doesn’t get polluted. A boat tour in Trang An is certainly much more eco-friendly than a luxury cruise in Halong Bay.

We also didn’t see any trash in the nature. That’s unfortunately a rare sight in many touristic places in Southeast Asia.

The place is also full of wildlife – mostly birds – which is always a good sign. And we think there is an unspoken rule about just sitting quietly while enjoying the place. None of the tourists were yelling or being loud.

All in all, the whole experience was very eco-friendly. You leave no footprint behind, yet you gain so much in return – your mind is forever full of beautiful memories.

So let’s work hard to leave Trang An like it is and not trash up the place in the future!

A photo journal from Trang An

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We hope you enjoyed this blog post about the boat tour in Trang An. It’s honestly still one of our travel highlights of Vietnam and we encourage everyone to visit this place.

Thanks for reading! And feel free to leave a comment with any questions or wonderings you might have about this wonderful place.

Read more blog posts from this area in Vietnam:

• Things to do in Tam Coc
• Visit Mua Caves Viewpoint
• Visit the Thai Vi Temple