For us, Vietnam was one of the cheapest places in South East Asia (in terms of cost of living), despite the fact we only visited two of the most expensive cities in the country. The street food in Hanoi is of a decent standard and costs very little, and the accommodation in both Hanoi and Sapa was cheap without being depressing. This perfect combination meant we always had creature comforts such as air con and would probably have stayed longer.

 

Visas

A visa on arrival can be obtained if you fly into Vietnam, although a letter of approval is required first. This can be done through an agency - we chose to do it online - and is pretty much stress-free as long as you give yourself a couple of days.

1. Apply online here: www.vietnamevisa.org
2. Fill out your details and pay the fee for the letter using paypal
3. Print out the letter of approval. We got ours on the same day, although this might take two working days.
4. Take the letter to the Visa on Arrival desk at the airport and pay according to the Visa you have applied for.  

The exact cost in our case was as follows:
Letter of application: 32 USD (single entry, total price for 2 people) - whether a single traveller would simply have to pay half that amount, I don’t know. Our names appeared on a letter with other travellers and were in Vietnamese - don’t be alarmed by this!
Visa on arrival: 45 USD single entry (30 days, price per person)

If you travel to Vietnam by land, you need to go to the Vietnamese embassy before crossing the border. Be prepared to leave your passport with them while they process your Visa - I believe this process takes a couple of days.  
 

Accommodation

As I mentioned, we felt that the standard of rooms in Vietnam was a lot higher than other places considering the price we paid:

 

Hanoi:

Having stayed in two different hotels near the old quarter in Hanoi, we paid 8€ a night (Lucky Hostel) and 11€ a night (Golden Time Hotel) for air conditioned, double rooms with breakfast included. The latter had excellent WiFi connection, questionable decoration and was very clean. The bathroom was very small but everything else made up for it.

 

Sapa:
We paid 6€ a night for a great little double room on the main street in Sapa appropriately named the Sapa Queen. Due to the time of year (late May) we didn't need air conditioning, and the fan was good enough for the afternoon heat. My understanding of Sapa’s mountain climate is that heaters are usually needed during the colder months, so take this into account before booking. 
 

Food and Drink

The food and drink in Hanoi was very cheap and very good, with dishes for lunch or dinner costing around 35,000 Vietnamese Dong VND (per person), which currently works out to about 1€. Try the Bun Cha (balls of barbecued pork with a small bowl of slightly sweet noodles in soup) which can be found in street stalls all over and cost around 25000 - 30000 VND per person depending on what part of the city you’re in (around 90 cents).

A bottle of Hanoi beer costs around 12,000 - 15,000 VND, which is around 50 cents. Expect to drink and eat on the street on little step stools if you want the cheaper of these prices (this suited me fine, because I’m short, but taller people might want to consider paying a bit more for a real chair in a restaurant).

In Sapa the prices shot up. The restaurants were obviously a lot “prettier” but the prices were generally 5 times higher (for a start, a lot of places advertised the price for a set menu in USD). We’re talking 180,000 VND / €6 for a set meal, which means you get a lot more than a noodle soup, granted, but perhaps you’re happy to eat something simpler and pay less.

I paid 90,000 for a “special wild pork” dish on the first day, in a restaurant fairly near the hotel, as we were too tired to look around after a night train - only to be given the worst food I had in Vietnam. Tasteless food that they think you’ll like because you’re foreign!
My advice: look for a street barbecue. We found one that was very hygienic on the main road - everything was nicely covered in cling film with no flies crawling all over the raw meat which is unfortunately too often the case in Asia. We spent 100,000 VND in total on chicken and pork barbecued meat on skewers (without drinks) and ate well.

On the last day we hired a scooter and went to some fields around the town eager to find somewhere for a basic lunch well away from the “tourist strip”. We stopped off at a family’s house / cornershop where we saw shelves of instant noodles for sale and two chairs that they didn’t mind us sitting on. The smiling mother added boiling water to them, put them in a plastic bowl and then charged us 60,000 VND - double the price of homemade noodles in the capital! The lesson we learned: always ask the price beforehand even if you’re somewhere that is dirty and cheap looking - the locals get greedy when they see travellers.
 

Excursions

The sights in Hanoi are rather mediocre in all honesty, as a lot of the information in museums and temples is in Vietnamese with no translation. The Women’s Museum was definitely one of the best museums, and I thought Hanoi Hilton prison was worth a visit, as the videos are quite informative. The temple of Literature is a nice place to relax and maybe read a book - unless you’re caught in a monsoon rainstorm like we were!

Prices per person:
War Museum: 40,000 VND  
Temple of Literature: 20,000 VND
Water Puppet Theatre: 200,000 VND
Hanoi Hilton Prison: 20,000 VND
Women’s Museum: 30,000 VND

 

Trekking in Sapa

This may seem obvious, but don’t go with a trekking agency if you want to visit one of the villages for a night. They use exactly the same guides as the ones you will find on the street (or rather the guides that will find you) and will charge around 60USD.
Simply walk around the amphitheatre in the centre, near the church, and get speaking to the Black H’mong women. Ask lots of questions to see if their English is good enough for you to understand them - part of the trek is learning about their life and talking to them after all - and if you feel they’re the right person for you - go for it! A lot of guides have mobile phones if you happen to have a Vietnamese number, but we decided on a time and place without any need for technology.
We didn’t stay at the guides house for the night, and chose to get a motorbike back to Sapa after the trek, as we already had accommodation booked, but would otherwise have gone for an overnight stay. Most backpackers do this, as you get to dine and drink with them and really get to know them.

 

We paid:
Guide for the day: 10 USD / 7€ pp (price given in USD, paid in VND).
Lunch: provided by guide
Motorbikes to Sapa: 70,000 VND / 2€

Here is the contact number for our guide, “Ma”: 0129 298 12 14

Transport

Buses:

We caught buses to and from the airport and the train stations in Hanoi - the average cost was between 7000 VND and 9000 VND for a ticket which is around 20 - 30cents. Google maps can help you find the route, so definitely consider this option instead of a taxi or shuttle bus from the station / airport if you want to save a night’s worth of accommodation!

 

We went to Sapa on a night train, which was probably one of the best we have been on so far. The standard bed was in a 6 person cabin with a door, but the price was, of course, a lot more expensive than other trains in Asia ( €75 - €80 - Hanoi to Sapa return) - with no cheaper option available.

 

Money makes the world go round

At the time of "calculating" €1 was equal to around 29,000 Vietnamese Dong. US dollars can be used in Vietnam if you need to, although they generally don't work with a set exchange rate and there is no financial benefit in doing this (as in Nepal or Cambodia). I found that the exchange rate could sometimes be negotiated with shopkeepers, so if you need to use dollars don't be afraid to haggle as you would in Vietnamese Dong.

 

So how much?!

We spent:
Visa: 61 USD per person (no other currency is accepted)
Accommodation based on 2 people sharing: €8 per night on average (see above for detail)
Excursions: approximately €40 in total, including scooter hire in Sapa (see above for detailed breakdown)
Transport to Sapa (return) from Hanoi: €79 each
Food & drink: €9 a day which included a lot of beer! (total for 2 people sharing with majority of time spent in Hanoi). Obviously if you don’t drink, this cost could be reduced even further.