A Day Trip to Ha Long Bay

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When I stepped out of the airport in Ha Noi, it was cold. So cold in fact that for the first time in a long time, I was able to see my breath. Apparently, it had been like this for a while (it knew I was coming) and the severe rain had been cancelling many trips to Ha Long Bay. The day that I had booked however, was the first sunny day in five days (when does that ever happen?) so it was going to be busy.

My bus was so packed that they had to use these little makeshift chairs for a few poor Japanese tourists who were unfortunately the last ones on the bus.

Within about ten minutes, I was of course, asleep but managed to wake myself up for the break at a ceramics factory about an hour and a half into the journey. Not that I should have bothered - none of that stuff would ever fit in my backpack!

I hopped back onto the bus and tried (well, not really) to stay awake but was unsuccessful.

Next thing I know, it's been three and a half hours since Ha Noi and I'm in Ha Long Bay. Sleeping constantly isn't always such a curse!

I jumped on board the boat to begin my sailing trip around a few of the three thousand or so islands that grace these green as grass waters.

Once the boat was on the way, we were allowed to sit up on top deck . Pretty impressive up there. I sat and watched as all the other boats (without wanting to exaggerate (too much) it looked like there were about fifty other boats out there with ours) and the clouds had just cleared to reveal a clear blue sky with the Sun beating down on us.

Time to take some photos! Oh. Wait. Neither of my cameras will turn on! So my SLR has pretty much died and after a while my point and shoot does switch on but won't focus. So I guess I win some and lose some today. I was given the Sun but the life of my cameras was taken away! Although, slight glimmer of hope: if I don't zoom on the small camera, it will take photos in focus. Phew.

As I attempted to take some photos, I noticed that a little boat, filled with fruit had pulled up alongside ours and its passengers were passing pineapples through our windows onto the lower deck. Lunch?

We made our way through the islands and stopped at a fishing village on the water. All the fish (biggest fish I've ever seen) were swimming around in a sectioned off part of the water under the floorboards. If you were hungry for one, you were able to pick one out and have it cooked for you on the boat.

After seeing some more islands, it was time for lunch. Lots of rice, veggies, tofu and quite strangely, a big bowl of peanuts for me fish, and general seafood for everyone else and of course, pineapple for dessert.

As I'm shoving pineapple into my mouth, the guide tells me it's time for kayaking and to get a move on. So I finished my mouthful and climbed into a kayak. I didn't want to go by myself I thought. But anyway, I kayaked off and all of a sudden I hear 'NICHOLAS!' (that's me) 'COME BACK!' What? Why? What did I do?

So I paddled on back to see what the panic was about. They wanted to put this old Italian guy in the kayak with me. Be careful what you wish for, I was definitely no longer alone in there.

He did not speak one tiny single word of English. And I do not speak any Italian whatsoever. I don't know if you've ever been kayaking, it's so much fun but generally, you kind of have to be able to understand or speak to the other person in your kayak so that you know where to go and how to get there. It's also especially difficult when you're trying to go straight and he's insistent on going right and tipping the boat almost into the water until he realises that you're heading for the cave and thinks it's a good idea.

We (more like I, I'm not sure if he thought I was some sort of guide or something) paddled around and into that cave I was heading for, back out, into a sort of enclosure and started to go back to our boat.

I'd pretty much had enough of this guy by now especially as he was raising his voice at me. I had no idea what he was saying though so I just ignored him completely. Which I think riled him a bit more. We finally made it back after a little detour to absolutely nowhere that he wanted to go to and he started screaming at the staff of the kayak business in Italian. He wasn't happy. Maybe making a complaint about the rubbish English guide they'd given him (that's me again) so I jumped off and left him to it.

The boat started up again and took us to a cave and I was feeling okay to go into this one.

Until I went in. It was huge and lit up in all different colours and I think I would have been fine had it not been for the possibly hundreds of Japanese people in bright orange tracksuits everywhere. Seriously though, everywhere.

I got up onto the very tips of my toes (as there were so many people trying to get through a narrow passage ahead that no one was moving) to see where the exit was and somehow managed to annoy the French woman behind me who looked me straight in the eye (when I turned) and very loudly tutted. She wasn't helping the situation much.

I made it out and back onto the boat in one piece and we set off back into the bay. I tried my SLR again and it worked! For two photos and then died. Poor camera.

The day was over for Ha Long Bay and I slept all the way back to Hanoi. If the craziness of Ha Noi is getting to you, a day trip to Ha Long is definitely worth it, if only just to calm your nerves and not have to listen to beeping traffic for a few hours.

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