Halong bay, Vietnam

Our tour was due to leave at 7.30am so we stored our luggage and sat in reception with the other travelers who were heading out to Halong Bay. A Minivan pulled up just after 8 and we had to sit apart as we were the last two on the bus. It takes 3 hours to Halong city so we made a pit stop about an hour in at a service station that sold Hotdogs, so we grabbed one for breakfast.

Premium Valentine, Halong bay, Vietnam

A further two hours on the bus, which everyone mainly spent staring at a Japanese guy who had huge video camera. He filmed almost everything, he'd turn around and film the rest of us on the bus, he filmed the service station, the driver, the views etc....

We pulled up at Halong pier around midday and there were literally hundreds of tourists there and dozens of ships. We were lead down to our boat which looked fairly nice and 15 of us got on board

Straight away we were seated for lunch. We ate with a couple from Stuggart and a Canadian couple. The food was really good. We had tofu, rice, chicken, fish, vegetables, meat spring rolls, chips and pineapple.

After lunch we were informed on what we would be doing over the next couple of days and then were taken to the first Island, to a cave system. The caves were huge, we climbed up a hill then dropped back down inside. We sort of stuck with the Canadians and missed the first half of the tour as we were taking pictures and talking but when we caught up we realized we hadn't missed much really. It was more of an entertainment tour than factual. Like they'd tell a story about Romeo and Juliet sailing down a river in Italy and somebody had seen them kissing and taken a photo. Then they'd shine a laser pen to a rock on the roof of the cave and it looked like two people kissing. The caves were pretty amazing though and we managed to get a few good pictures before leaving.

Our boat had 3 decks. The sleeping quarters were on the lower deck. The restaurant and bar on the 2nd and the top deck was for chilling and admiring the views. We made our way to the top deck with everyone and for the next 1 hour not one person spoke. I don't think I even spoke to Jo
.
We made our way into the bay and the views were breathtaking. The water was calm and flat, we'd somehow managed to lose every other ship around and we just sailed through these huge, jagged rocks that stuck out of the water like Icebergs.

Halong bay is a UNESCO world heritage site and its easy to see why. The most beautiful place I've ever been is Xel-ha, Mexico and I didn't think anywhere would ever get close to that but Halong Bay is a very, very close second.

It has 1,960 Islands, half of which are un-named. Usually the weathers a little bit misty and cool but our tour guide said we were lucky and although it was cool we had really good visibility. We managed to see some of the famous wildlife in Halong bay and got pretty close to a few of the falcons that were circling the islands. Jo also pointed out to me what she thought was an oversize carrier bag in the water but turned out to be a huge jellyfish.

We docked at Cat Ba island mid afternoon and dropped off a German couple who were taking the 3 day/2 night trip. They would stay in a hotel and then on the boat the following night

We spent 45 minutes inside playing cards with our tour guide Mr. Banana who I'm sure was cheating as he beat Jo and I twice even though he'd just learnt the game.

We stopped at a floating raft that was sort of part fish farm, part kayaking rental. There wern't enough kayaks so we had a quick chat to Rachelle and Kevin (Canadians) and then we were left in the queue and got talking to a couple from Tasmania who were really nice. Two kayaks became available so we jumped in and headed to a cave about 200yards away. We dodged a few small boats and made it to the overhanging cave. Unfortunately we haven't any photos of us kayaking, as you all know what we are like with cameras and water.

After kayaking we got back on the boat and checked into our rooms. Our room was really nice, small and compact. We had a double bed a fan and a bathroom but what really made the room was the surrounding views. We had 3 large windows and we had the best views of a large rock we'd moored up against and we were going to spend the night here. What a great place to wake up!

Dinner as we've now started calling it as tea causes so many problems and confuses southerners, Americans, Australians etc... was served at 6,30pm. Again it was really good. We sat down with Lucy a girl from London and a lad from China (who i'm not going to attempt to write his name as its difficult enough to say it).

After eating we played a few games of card before learning a couple of Chinese card games which were better than our usual rummy and blackjack. It took us a few goes to get it but we had a really good night playing and exchanging travel stories.

Everyone was pretty tired around 11ish so we headed to our cabin and went to sleep.

Jo will blog tomorrow but this trip already has been one of the highlights of asia. Having spent time in the amazing Halong bay, on our old school pirate ship and having a nice cabin to sleep in has really excited us about our Alaskan cruise. We've spent the trip with some really good people who we're going to try to keep in touch with.

To more information about Halong bay, please click here: Indochina Sails