Ha Long Bay

An early start today for the 160 km bus trip from Hanoi to Ha Long Bay. Once there, it was straight onto our junk for the two day cruise of the famous bay in the Gulf of Tonkin.

The bay area covers over 700 square kilometers and consists of 2000 limestone islands in all shapes and forms. Ha Long translates to “Where the dragon descends into the sea.” They’re real big on dragons, tortoises, the Phoenix, lions and such things here.

Our junk had about fifteen passengers that were waited on hand and foot by the seven crew members. Upon arrival we had a seafood lunch and within the hour the tour had started.

Apart from touring the many islands there was also a stop off at one with massive cave formations within. One of the caverns must have been the size of the Docklands stadium and very impressive. The waters of the bay are an emerald green, which you’ll see in a number of the photos included in the blog.

We spent part of the afternoon at a local floating fishing village were we took some kayaks out onto the bay and also purchased a couple of kilos of live mantis shrimps which I had the chef on the junk cook up for dinner. Half steamed in beer and the other half as Salt & Pepper Shrimp. Over-nighting on the water, eating fresh shrimp, drinking tiger beer and listening to “the king” with the ipod - doesn’t get too much better.

Had to resort to the ipod as the crews taste in music came from an area devoid of the light giving rays of the sun. I didn’t fancy hearing music from “Titanic” in such a setting and “Fernando’s Hideaway” was great (back in the 1940’s.)

Some squid fishing after dinner and had a relatively early and peaceful night. Peaceful in the sense that it is so quiet out on the water and the Tiger beer played a not insignificant role in dulling the senses.

An 8:00am start to complete the tour with a 12:00pm return to Ha Long City for a final repast before a hair-raising 4 hour bus trip back to Hanoi. I’m no going to dwell on the near head on collisions because they are routine here, we did however run out of fuel half an hour before reaching our destination and had to wait for a replacement bus - running out of fuel is a disturbing emergent pattern this trip.

It’s worth noting that some of the literature on Vietnam suggest booking your Ha Long tours online prior to arrival so you don’t end up with some shonky operator, and there are a great of them in Hanoi (all about as shifty as a C’Wood supporter who has blown their dole cheque.)

All prices quoted online however are above the odds and should be avoided. We booked through our hotel in Hanoi and got the same tour for 35% of the online price. Do however, book your hotel in advance on line though. This bay tour is highly recommended.

May 26 was a quite one with a tour of some of the key sites around Hanoi before an evening departure on the “Reunification Express” back south as far as Hue on the central coast. Stops today included the Army museum, the museum of Ethnology and the Ho Chi Minh Museum where we were fortunate enough to see old Ho’s chest expander and his thongs (the variety worn on the foot.)