My wife and I are due to travel to Melbourne next year for a wedding. We would like to stop off in Hanoi on the way and spend a week in Vietnam. Can you suggest a suitable airline to use? Tim Gassick, Purley on Thames

Sunday Times travel expert Richard Green responds: Vietnam Airlines don't yet fly to the UK, so for now your best option is to break the journey in South East Asia and then make a side trip from there.

Trailfinders (0845 050 5871) has fares with Singapore Airlines (via Singapore) to Melbourne from £1,277 for example, which includes a return flight with Vietnam Airlines from Singapore to Hanoi.

Other good specialists on flights to Australia include Austravel (0844 873 0977); Dial a Flight (0870 333 4488), and Flight Centre (0800 587 0058).

You'll need a few days in Hanoi itself, with its charming Old Quarter, wealth of sights, and frantic street life. After that you could head over to the calm of Halong Bay, and take a boat ride through some of the 3,000-odd limestone peaks that jut from the water there.

And for a nice contrast to the cost, head up to some exquisite mountain air in the Tonkinese Alps. The old hill station at Sapa is a delightful place to unwind among the rice terraces and hill tribes.

If it's a beach break that you are after though, the best ones are in the south of the country, much more easily reached from Ho Chi Minh City. You could easily make your side trip to the south instead, or fly to Hanoi and out of Ho Chi Minh City, with a domestic flight in between.

Times recommends

• New York's top 10 new hotels
• A Scottish monastery retreat
• Welcome back to Rwanda