4 to 6 March - Hanoi and Halong Bay


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Asia » Vietnam » Red River Delta » Hanoi
March 27th 2012
Published: April 15th 2012
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Our first full day in Hanoi is Sunday, and as most of the significant monuments are closed on Monday, we decide to head out to Halong Bay the next day. The weather is quite mild at this time of the year (15 to 18 degrees with mist, haze and light showers), so we decide to limit the trip to just an overnight on a junk. We find an AsianaTravelMate office and book the deluxe trip on the Calypso Cruiser - quite an exotic name for what the boat turns out to be.

We start our first day we a tour of the Old Quarter. Its a fascinating rabbit warren of little streets, each one specialising in a particular ware whether it be buttons, musical instruments, catering equipment or in the case of the street we were staying in, locks. It is wet and grimey as we walked about the streets, very evocative and the little tour gives you a great taste of what old Hanoi was like.

In the afternoon we meet Alex and Ellen at the Hanoi Backpackers. It's a fairly recent addition to the streets of the old quarter, western run and literally bursting with young travellers from all over the world. They make a delicious ginger and apple mojito. With Ellen and Alex is our young mate Ben from Hoi An. He arrived at the backpackers at literally the same moment as Alex and Ellen. So the 5 of us head out to San Van Dong Hang Day (Hanoi Stadium) for an evening of V League football or Bong Da as the locals call it. The V League is the local equivalent of the Premier League and we are off to see the local derby between Hanoi T&T and visitors from down the road Haiphong.

Considering the condition of the field its not a bad standard of football. The locals have turned out in good numbers and the crowd looks to be about 15,000. The visiting crowd from Haiphong is very also strong and the opposite side of the field is awash in red. The chanting of the visitors puts the locals to shame. The Viets in general are very quiet supporters in general and the Hanoi supporters are timid considering that they are favorites and sitting quite in the championship table. So quiet in fact that when Ben and I yell out it did tend to carry some way. The fact that we called several players cheating eunuchs was lost on the crowd.

And so the game took the usual course with the favourites Hanoi scoring twice, one in each half. Despite this the visiting supporters continued to cheer their players on, and did so even when the rain started to get heavy.



The Halong Bay cruise begins like all tours in Vietnam with a half hour wait at our hotel for the regulation pick up. Small blessing, in this instance the mini bus that picks us up will take us directly to our tour attraction and not to another point of disembarkation to be shunted from one bus to another. The trip to Halong Bay is 4 hours in the minibus, and despite this being the number one attraction to Vietnam, the road that takes the millions each year from Hanoi is miserably potholed. We share the bumpy ride with 19 others in our party. They come from the usual places, France, England, America and some Viet Aussies. This last group are known locally as Viet Khieu, the returnees and they have a special status in the country. We find at times this is not always positive. Mercifully there are no Russians. Our tour guide is a cheery chap called Vuong.



Alex, Ellen and Ben have also decided to take a Halong Bay cruise for the same evening. Theirs is something called the booze cruise and run out of the back packers.



The drive out of Hanoi in the minibus is a minor test of endurance. As we get closer to the bay, we start to see the karst outcrops both on land and out to sea. You can sense by the head turns of each of us in the minibus that our interest is starting to pique. Even the shroud of mist and haze that is hanging over the area is not dampening the mood. After enduring the ride we arrive at the port of Halong Bay right on noon to join a throng of fellow tourists awaiting boats. Noon each day is the time when most of the 400 boats that ply the bay arrive and depart the port – each boat disgorging its passengers and picking up its next load for a cruise, be it a day cruise or overnight. Vuong tells that only half of the fleet are certified to stay out overnight, so we shouldn’t be too crowded out in the bay.



After Vuong’s colleague and captain arrange the necessary paperwork, we are placed on a punt and motored out to our boat the Calypso Cruiser. The Calypso is quite well appointed and a newish construction – 2009. It doesn’t appear to be anything like the junks that have recently sunk so we are not too worried. Its styled like an old Chinese junk but instead of sails the boat runs exclusively on diesel motors



After settling into our very cushy sleeping quarters, the boat motors out some 90 minutes from Halong Bay port. We meander through the karst outcrops that are the prize of Halong Bay. With dense mist cutting in and out, the islands are totally blanked out, emerging occasionally from the shroud only to disappear again. There are 2000 islands in the Halong Bay making navigation in these conditions a huge challenge. Today we are part of a flotilla that sensibly is making that trip in single file.



The trip is very pleasant but the over-riding feature of the sail out from the port is the pollution all around us in the water. The volume is staggering – bags, bottles and all sorts of plastic bits and polystyrene. Any thoughts of a swim are quickly extinguished. And it is so typical of the Viet not to recognise the garbage in their number one tourist attraction as a threat.



In the middle of the afternoon we drop anchor in a tight cove with half a dozen other junk style cruise boats. A small tender takes us around a number of small islands to another cove where we are to see the “Amazing” cave. Our guide Vuong continues on and on about the amazingness of the Amazing cave, hence it name. Unfortunately we had to share the amazingness of the cave with about 30 other boatloads of tourists who had all descended on this spot in the middle of the afternoon. It appears that there is a fair degree of congruence in the schedules in Halong Bay. Also interesting was the number of Russians and French groups. Anyway we are herded up the narrow path to the entrance of what is actually 3 distinct caves, and to be honest the Amazing cave is not the greatest of caves. Probably the most interesting feature of the cave system are the sphere-like indents on the cavern ceilings, each the size of a football. The pockmarks are the result of carbolic acid, found naturally in the water, acting on the limestone ceiling. The pockmark ceilings are an interesting contrast to the stalactites and stalagmites. Overall the cave was grubby with quite a lot of graffiti present. The other interesting feature of the caves was the penguin rubbish bins dotted around the place. Also, the penchant for tour guides escorting their gaggle around the caves to describe the rock formations as dogs, tigers and dinosaurs. (You can just see the guides during their orientation briefings getting the descriptions sorted). There was a rather phallic looking outcrop which cave management had decided warranted special attention and so it was given special effect lighting.



After completing the cave tour we returned to the boat for relaxation in the mist. In the evening we had a cooking class and then spruced up for dinner. That was pleasant and we dined with Thierry and Elizabeth (a French couple residing in Phnom Penh) and a young American couple who were holidaying from their teaching job in Thailand. The company was pleasant but the food was so un-Viet, more like Chinese takeaway, sweet and sour and the like. We had the same heavy fare at all the meals on board. In the evening we tried our hand at squid fishing. I nearly jagged one but the sightings were far and few.



The next day we take a quick paddle in kayaks in through an island cave into a secret cove where we see a colony of monkeys. They come close to the shore and are obviously used to visitors. After the paddle we have more relaxation time in the mist. And then the cruiser makes its way back to the port of Halong Bay, again through the mist shrouding the islands and in a very careful single file convoy with many other boats. Overall the Halong Bay experience was pleasing. Certainly not the highlight that many people talk of it but it probably is a lot better in the warmer months, as Vuong our guide kindly pointed out. The big downer is the pollution that is everywhere. We heard rumours later that there are murmurs of UNESCO downgrading the status of the park. Not sure what will happen here, particularly as so many are content reaping a hell of a lot of tourist dollars now while the going is good to the detriment of…sorry too heavy. Anyway you get the picture. With mixed feelings we boarded our mini bus for the crunching ride back to Hanoi and the comfortable beds of the Indochina Queen, number 2.

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