Charter the whole ship, and the itinerary becomes yours
Exclusive hire of one or more vessels. No other passengers on board, no fixed departure time, no standard tourist route. The programme is built around your agenda rather than fitted into somebody else's schedule.
What you are actually buying
A charter is not a discount for booking a lot of cabins. It is a different product. On a shared sailing you buy seats on a schedule; on a charter you buy the schedule itself.
| What changes | Shared sailing | Full charter |
|---|---|---|
| Departure time | Fixed, typically 11:45–12:15 from the port | Movable by about ninety minutes either way, subject to port clearance |
| Route | The standard licensed tourist route | Any licensed route, including the quieter eastern anchorages |
| Dining | Set menu, shared dining room, fixed sittings | Your menu, one sitting, dining room yours alone |
| Sun deck | Shared, no rigging permitted | Yours. Stage, backdrop, lighting and rehearsal all possible |
| Branding | None | Banners, backdrop, branded welcome — within what the crew can rig safely |
| Anchorage overnight | Wherever the operator's block is assigned | Requested anchorage, subject to availability and the harbourmaster |
| Late-night noise | Curfew applies from about 22:00 | Curfew still applies. Anchorages are shared water and the rule is not ours to waive |
The overnight noise curfew at the anchorages is set by the bay authority, not by the vessel owner. A chartered ship is still moored two hundred metres from other vessels carrying sleeping passengers. If your programme needs a loud band running past midnight, it needs to happen ashore. We would rather tell you now than have the crew shut it down at 22:15.
Indicative charter rates
Charter is quoted per vessel per night, not per person. That is the honest structure, and it is also why charter gets cheaper per head the fuller the ship is — the number below does not move whether you sail with thirty guests or forty-four.
| Vessel class | Cabins | Max guests | Per vessel, per night (USD) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Deluxe | 10 – 14 | 20 – 28 | 2,900 – 4,600 |
| Premium | 18 – 22 | 36 – 44 | 5,200 – 8,400 |
Included: exclusive use of the vessel, all cabins, crew and captain, fuel, harbour dues, bay entry fees for the licensed route, all meals in the programme, tea and coffee service, kayaks and the standard on-board activity equipment.
Not included: gala production (stage, sound, lighting, MC, band), road transfer from Hanoi, alcohol beyond the welcome service, photography and video, and any shore programme.
October and November run 20–30% above the numbers above. December to February run 15–25% below them. See the season page before you take these figures into a budget meeting.
When charter is the wrong answer
We would rather lose the larger booking than sell you a charter you did not need. Three cases where it does not pay:
- Under about 26 guests on a Premium vessel. You are paying for eighteen cabins and filling thirteen. Either move down to a Deluxe hull or take a cabin block.
- A single-night programme with no evening production. If nothing is happening on the sun deck and dinner is a normal dinner, most of what charter buys goes unused.
- A group that has not committed a headcount. Charter is priced on the hull. If your number is genuinely uncertain between thirty and fifty, a cabin block absorbs that uncertainty and a charter does not.
The paperwork nobody mentions until it bites
- Passenger manifest. Filed with the port authority before departure. Full names as they appear on passport or ID, plus nationality and document number. This is why the rooming list locks at D-14.
- Foreign nationals. Passport details are required, not a scan of a business card. Chasing these in the last week is the single most common reason a group programme runs late on the day of departure.
- Under-16 guests. Permitted, but they count against the cabin capacity and some activity elements have age limits. Tell us at brief stage.
- Departure clearance. Issued on the day by the port authority, on the basis of the weather. No operator on the bay can pre-guarantee it. See port closure policy.
Questions we are asked most often
Can we charter two vessels and keep everyone together?
Together during the day, yes — the ships sail in company and anchor within a hundred metres of each other. Together in the evening, only if everyone fits on one sun deck, which caps out around seventy. Beyond that the honest options are a shore gala or two parallel dinners, and we normally recommend the shore gala.
Can we change the departure time?
By roughly ninety minutes either side of the standard slot, subject to port clearance on the day. Larger shifts are occasionally possible and have to be requested at contract stage, not the week before.
Can we bring our own AV company?
Yes, with a site visit first. The constraint is generator capacity and rigging points, not our preference. A crew that has never worked a vessel will typically arrive with a rig the ship cannot power.
Do you charter third-party vessels?
Above about two hundred guests we have to, and we say so in the quote — which hulls are ours and which are not. On a third-party hull we can commit to the same service standard but not to the same control over the schedule, and the contract reflects that difference.
Where to go next
Four fields and you can send
Tell us the basics and we will come back within eight working hours with feasibility — including how many hulls your headcount actually needs — and within three working days with a detailed quote.