Vietnam cruise review: A life of luxury meets Asian excitement

Good night Halong Bay, good morning Hong Kong.

Closing the curtains in one country and opening them in another is a special experience. Particularly when it's your butler who's pulling the curtains and the windows open out on to your own private balcony.

It's a tough life on a luxury cruise.

My voyage began in Ho Chi Minh City – or Saigon, as the locals still call it. Arrive here and you're plunged into a hectic hive of activity. Bikes, heat, fish, bikes, rice, cars, more bikes, beer, dogs, bright lights, more bikes.

Vietnam's largest city is a sharp contrast to the calm of a cruise ship.

Crossing a Saigon road is like navigating stepping stones: you start by tip-toeing tentatively before trusting your instincts and leaping forward.

Take the latter attitude to the city as a whole and you reap the rewards.

Docked within a 20-minute walk or five-minute moped ride of Saigon's historic heart, an overnight stay provided just enough time to enjoy the town's excitement.

More than 40 years after the scrambled American evacuation, the influence of the war remains strong, but is just one piece in a mesmerising jigsaw of ancient, colonial, communist and contemporary influences.

As I sweated my way from Ben Thanh Market to Notre Dame Cathedral and saluted revolutionary father Ho Chi Minh in front of the old Hotel de Ville, the puzzle became clearer.

I read billboards covered in one-sided war stories on the approach to Dong Khoi Street, where the Government propaganda was replaced by elegant French buildings, Louis Vuitton and the Hotel Continental.

And in the lush grounds of Independence Palace – just 800 metres east of the Hotel Continental – tanks were still resting across the grass from where communist soldiers bulldozed through the gates and raised the red flag in April 1975.

If it wasn't for the ceaseless heat and swarms of bikes, I could have been in a different century and continent around every corner.

Leaving was a challenge, but thankfully a healthy dose of wining and dining helped ease the pain.

Travel with Silversea and the luxury begins before you've left home.

You're presented with a personalised itinerary, luggage tags and instructions on your ship's three different dress codes (although I'm still not clear on what 'sports wear appropriate for a five-star resort' includes).

And it continues from the instant you are welcomed aboard.

"Which toiletries would you like Mr Leather? And you've a choice of nine different pillows, let me know which one you'd prefer. Meanwhile, is there anything in particular you'd like in your minibar?"

From that moment on, like a Google advert, the affable bar team eerily seem to know what to offer you before you've even decided you're having a drink.

"Glenmorangie, Mr Leather?"

A luxury cruise ship is certainly no place for recovering alcoholics.

Neither is it the place if you are counting calories – it would be a sin not to feast on the delicious delicacies on offer.

But eating on board isn't easy. From the second you wake you've important decisions to make.

Buffet, à la carte or breakfast in bed?

British, American or Canadian bacon?

Pancakes or pastries, fruit or fry-up?

Thank goodness there's the hot tub, the sauna, and the magic-handed masseuse to work away the stress.

But if you thought breakfast was tough, just wait until dinner.

Luckily, whatever you plump for – be it fine international dining in the restaurant, Italian ingenuity in La Terrazza, grilling your own rib-eye by the pool or taking luxury to a new level at Le Champagne – enjoyment is guaranteed.

iPads with pictures of every single guest ensure the waiting staff in every establishment know you by name and not once do they mix up an order.

With everything except gluten-free options cooked fresh on board (the ice cream is even created in the galley), the ship offers all the perks of fine dining without the puny portions.

Moreover if the menu still doesn't have something to your taste, give executive chef Jerome Foussier 24 hours notice and he'll cook anything you order.

This extreme service is what allows Silver Sea to market itself as ultra-luxury.

Yet there are a few very minor improvements that would help the ship shine like the ultimate resort.

The top-deck gym provides stunning views but is low on space and equipment, while the DVD library is crammed full of mainstream mis-hits and family fun on a boat where the only children are the captain's toddlers. Issues like these that would normally be insignificant stand out because of the blatant quality elsewhere.

The poor quality of the in-room televisions and their word-art style graphics are all the more noticeable when the staff carry top-of-the-range tablets down corridors lined with $65k paintings.

But with a $170 million makeover of the Silversea fleet planned, it seems the ultra-luxury liner knows its incredible service needs slick modern boats to match.

Next stop Nha Trang

With the Silver Shadow almost as long as the Saigon River was wide, a troupe of tenacious tugboats were needed to help turn the ship around before we could set sail for open water.

And as we meandered out to the South China Sea attracting hundreds of selfie-taking dock workers, it was time to sample the ship's all-inclusive delights.

Although a giant next to the coal barges that chunter along industrial Saigon, the Silver Shadow is a baby goldfish when compared to the blue whale-sized boats common in the cruising world. But what she lacks in scale she makes up for in service, style and most of all food.

Whether I was sharing a lift to the observation deck, sweating last night's scotch out in the sauna, or ironing a shirt to match the evening's dress code, one topic dominated small talk: dinner.

And with good reason.

Even that evening's 'casual' dining at the pool bar and grill was spectacular – prime rib-eye steak and emperor-sized prawns grilled at our table on 400C lava rocks. Other nights included à la carte Italian La Terrazza, in-suite dining and the 400-seater main restaurant. And not once was my wine glass empty.

A couple more bottles, a dozen new friends and 215 nautical miles later and the curtains were opened in Nha Trang, where the south-east Asian sun burned away the early morning cloud to reveal a high-rise city and sand ringed by a row of green hills.

The lunchtime departure left enough time to see the ancient Cham Towers, mooch and munch grilled lobster on the beach.

Here, as ever, the locals did a fine job of competing with the Silver Shadow's classy cookery. But not even the tastiest of pho or freshest of lobster could compete with the star of the Silversea show – Le Champagne.

The Relais & Châteaux restaurant was the only onboard eatery where a cover charge was needed, but the mushroom cappuccino justified it alone.

Then there was foie gras, caviar, lobster and delicious desserts I didn't fully understand, all served by waiters who could debone a fish at the table faster than you can say 'voila.' Bravo.

Waking in industrial Chan May next morning was less spectacular. But thankfully the eyesore port served as a gateway to some of Vietnam's most historical towns.

Hue ho, let's go

I chose Hue and its Imperial City – another location where wildly different sections of Vietnam's modern history interact to make the town what it is today.

A mixture of Chinese-style temples, pagodas and palaces, the Imperial City is where Emperor Minh Mang entertained his hundreds of wives, mistresses and children in the 19th century.

Brutally, only around one in seven of the city's buildings survived the first few months of 1968 – when American forces fought a bloody and costly battle with the North Vietnamese – and the ongoing restoration work served as a reminder of the reconstruction effort needed across the country in the decades since the war.

Aside from the obligatory visit to the tourist-trap shop ran by our expert guide's friend, the tour – complete with dragonboat cruise along the Perfume River, a humid but pretty pagoda and a tomb that matched the scale of the Minh Mang's love-making – was an informative treat.

Next stop Halong Bay.

Who knew arriving at a destination could be such an experience?

Furry green karst islands poked through the shimmering blue water, which rippled as the wind broke through the humidity and teamed up with the sun to usher any clouds away.

As the rays shone down and we sailed through the lagoon-like sea, I felt like I was travelling back to a jurassic world – only with a luxury liner and a deck full of grinning guests for company.

Even the well-travelled crew rushed outside for a selfie before we docked just short of the city and its incongruous backpacker bars, high-rise hotels and illuminated bridge.

Away from the Las Vegas-style tack, Halong City did provide the best local food of the trip.

As the only westerners in a room full of hungry workers sat on miniature stools, our determination to break through the language barrier paid off in the form of a hunger-busting bowl of steaming spicy broth, noodles, veggies and meat.

Swapping the 186-metre long cruise ship for a 20-metre junk boat tour of the islands and their magical caves made the stop-off complete.

Next it was full steam ahead for a bumpy 36 hours and 393 nautical miles to Hong Kong.

While others enjoyed a singalong and a 'British pub lunch', I spent the wet and windy final day at sea in the gym, the hot tub and the spa, before savouring a last six-course feast and a party made all the more fun by the vertical movement of the ship rocking revellers around the dancefloor.

A few hours later and eggs benedict in front of the Hong Kong skyline killed any sign of a hangover.

Between despondently disembarking and begrudgingly boarding the flight home, there was just enough time to pop 428 metres up Victoria Peak and enjoy one of Asia's best cityscapes.

Three days later and back in Britain, my ship legs were still swaying – from a deep desire to return as much as the sea.

• Silversea’s Silver Shadow departs on a 14-day voyage from Hong Kong to Singapore on October 8 2017. The voyage calls at Ha Long Bay; Chan May; Nha Trang; Ho Chi Minh City; Bangkok and Koh Samui before arriving in Singapore. Fares start from £4,550 per person based on double occupancy of the Vista Suite. For more information visit www.silversea.com or call 0844 251 0837.