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12 hours of awesome sleep later we were up early to go on our trip to Ha Long bay. We decided to book an extra night in the same hotel after Halong Bay as we have a flight down to Hue on Saturday morning. The woman on reception said we could have a reduced rate for returning guests and they stored our big bags for free so we only needed our day bags for the 1 night in Halong. The minibus journey was uneventful (by Vietnamese driving standards - absolute bedlam by UK standards) and we arrived at Halong City at around noon. There was a bit of confusion as to which boat we would be on, we got told to sit down, stand up, sit down... before we eventually joined our group on board the boat we were supposed to be on in the first place.
We booked the tour through a company called Ethnic Travel as recommended by our Rough Guide Vietnam book. They specialise in low impact tourism and were very helpful throughout. Anyone reading this researching Halong bay we'd definitely recommend these guys. We only booked the 1 day option but they do have longer tours.
There are so many different tour options and offices in Hanoi you need to be careful you don't get ripped off. Anyway, back to the boat...
So on board was us, a french couple, a french family of 5 (who were a bit of a pain), a guy called Andy (half Scottish, half Filipino) and an English girl called Helen. Despite having only met each other earlier that morning Andy and Helen had to share a room as the French family demanded 3 rooms for them and their kids as they refused to share. Andy and Helen were surprisingly chilled about the whole thing and the French family seemingly oblivious that they were being rather rude.
It took us about 2 hours to reach our first stop in the bay at a floating village where we went out for some kayaking around the bay. It was slightly less a village, more a couple of floating huts but it's still crazy to think people live out there in one room. Even though we sailed out for a good couple of hours it didn't feel quite as remote as I expected. Still, the good thing for the villagers is if
they don't like their neighbours they can just float off somewhere else! We kayaked around a bay and some islands for about an hour before heading back to the boat. The French kids then decided (without asking) that they would climb to the top of the boat and dive in the water which the captain was not impressed with! Some arguing ensued between a vietnamese crew member and the french mum who didn't seem to realise her kids were being brats. Eventually it was agreed that everyone could dive in from the lower level of the boat - an offer which I couldn't refuse!
After a quick swim we were on board and travelling to our stop for the night. There are a lot of boats out in the bay (a major shipping lane runs right through it!) but our tour moored in a quiet bay with only 1 other boat boat nearby so it was very peaceful. The food cooked up by the crew was really good and they catered for us vegetarian / vegans very well! We'd even stocked up on snacks before we left just in case but we didn't need any! After dinner we sat
up on the top deck with Andy and Helen, drinking a few beers and chatting. The silhouettes of the limestone rocks made for an impressive setting and the fishing ships in the distance with their big floodlights illuminating some of the islands and made everything look like a move set.
Our room was of a decent standard (I only saw 1 cockroach) but did have the worlds worst pillows and the glass window panes rattled with the sway of the boat (which I managed to solve by wedging some tissue in the window). We were up for breakfast at 7 and were out in the kayaks again before 8 and headed over to a nearby cave. We were able to get out on this island and wander through the cave into a small bay on the other side. The local fishermen from the floating villages also use the caves to shelter from bad storms and religious offerings. The sad thing about the bay being so popular is there was a fair bit of litter and disguarded fishing items that wash up with the tide. Once the French family decided they'd had enough of holding everyone up again we were
back on the boat and headed back to Halong City. The scenery is absolutely amazing and going at a slow pace means you have plenty of time to take it all in. Sadly all good things come to an end and we were back on dry land saying goodbye to our new friends as we headed back to Hanoi.
When we got back to the hotel the lady on reception recognised us and after chatting for a bit she said she would upgrade our room for no extra charge! We weren't sure what to expect as the first room was pretty nice but we opened the door to find we'd been given a suite! 2 bathrooms, bedroom, living room and balcony! All for less than a Premier Inn - amazing!! And just to make our day double awesome, we also discovered we were able to book a flight for next week from Da Nang down to Nha Trang instead of the 12 hour night train we thought we'd have to endure!
After getting over our excitement we headed out into Hanoi and took a walk onto Den Ngoc Son on Hoan Kiem Lake to see the pagoda. It's
a welcome haven of relative peace in the buzz of the city. To finish the day we had tickets booked to the water puppet theatre. We'd heard that it was slightly bizzare but a must-see in Hanoi. Well, we weren't disappointed... It was a rather psychedelic 40 minutes! Traditional vietnamese songs, conversation (we have NO idea what they were saying) and music accompanying freaky puppets acting out scenes in a water filled stage at the front. My personal favourite was "Buffalo Boy playing the flute". Feeling slightly weirded out we took some time to see the buzz of the night market before returning to the salvation of the aircon in our suite.
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