Advertisement
Published: October 8th 2007
Edit Blog Post
Another early morning and we were on our way to Halong Bay. We didn't know too much about it when we arrived in Vietnam but the pictures and the itinery looked amazing so we had high hopes. The 3 hr drive to the port was an experience dodging in and out of cars and bikes all the way but was airconditioned and comfy but best of all the sun was still shining! We arrived at the port to the amazing sight of about 50+ Junk boats which are big wooden sleeper boats, they looked fantastic. Our guide greased the palms of one of the captains and we were led to our boat. It was brilliant, realy luxurious, had our own cabin, hot water, great views, what more could you ask for. Anyway about 20 mins later we were off, cruising slowly towards the many islands in the area, hardly any are inhabited as they are like big rocks with trees on (see pics). We were sharing our boat with about 10 other people which was nice as it wasn't crowded at all, and they all seemed realy nice (we were the only brits, thankfully they all spoke great English, we felt
soooo lazy!). It was then time for lunch, which was included in the price and we didn't have too high hopes at this point as we hadn't paid much for the trip in the first place. We all sat down and the food just kept coming, delicious, fresh and loads of it!
We made our first stop and a massisve cave which the locals use to live in many many years ago which was quite spectacular, then we moved on to one of the many small beaches for a spot of sunbathing and swimming before it was time to get back on the boat and head to where we were going to drop anchor for the night. All the boats on the water did the same and it was an amazing sight all these boats just bobbing about in the middle of this area surrounded by the small islands. After a couple of hours larking about and jumping of the boat with the germans (Oliver, Dorothy, Mark & Kat) it was time for more food, oh and was also Beer O'clock. We spent the night on the top deck looking out at the stars and all the other boats
around all lit up, it was just marvelous.
After a good sleep in our cabin we were up arly for breakfast as we were headed to the largest inhabited island in the area, CatBa. Breakfast was great and it realy set us up for our mid morning kayak through the islands and into a big green lagoon, right by monkey island. We did our best to call out to the monkeys and get them to come and help paddle the Kayak but it was too hot so they were happy in the shade of the trees, i.e we didn't see any! We then transfered to a realy small beaten up taxi boat to take us to another beach for a swim and then onto CatBa.
Once we arrived at Catba we checked into our 0 star hotel and got ready for a treck up one of the local mountains. We were met by our guide who was a realy nice local guide who bizarely wrote more english than he could speak. Our treck took 2 hrs and was hot! We didn't see any of the animals that were advertised on the brochure but it was sooo hot i
guess the were all sleeping. The last part of our treck he took us to a genuine bat cave (no not where Batman lives!) which was rather eerie, and was absolutely full of bats! We said goodbye to our guide and it was back to the hotel for food. We spent the night just sitting on the port side drinking Bia Hoi (9p beer), what more can you ask for?
Early morning (again!) and we were taken to Catba port to our boat to take us back to Halong Bay and then back to Hanoi. It was realy relaxing but was also realy sad as we knew we had to say goodbye to Halong Bay, we could have spent weeks here just cruising around, Highly Recommended! Once we arrived back in Hanoi we said goodbye to our new found German friends and after some food we were whisked away to get our sleeper bus to our next destination, Hue.
..............P.S Some of you may have noticed the date on this latest blog is about 2 weeks ago, sorry i am a bit behind at the moment but it is a culmination of lack of internet and too
much to do. However we are now on the Beach in Cambodia where i intend to catch up a little bit. Hope you are all enjoying the blogs.
G & L
Advertisement
Tot: 0.114s; Tpl: 0.012s; cc: 7; qc: 45; dbt: 0.0594s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
Rich
non-member comment
OOOOOOOOOOoooooooo
OOoo Ha Long Bay! tis on my list of places i want to go!! looks amazing... and that has seemed to of been confirmed by you! glad you guys are having fun! keep us posted!