Ha Long Bay aka: Halong Bay

Ha Long Bay is simply magnificent. The experience of crusing on the bay is just fabulous. There are a lot of tours available. I did the two nights, three day cruise, where you sleep on the boat both nights. I really feel that two nights gives you a better appreciation. Our guide says there are 500 tourist boats out there on Ha Long Bay, while we were crusing we didn’t actually see any other boats. Although we saw lots and lots of boats when we visited Hang Sung Sot or the magnificent limestone cave. It was a truely ginormous cave.

I may not have been here, but I did get to Phang Nga Bay in Thailand. Its pretty similar, so that may have to do. I’d still like to go here though.

Sleeping on a junk is definite experience to be devoured.

Be very careful when booking tours… I did a lot of research before booking ours. Worked out well, but the boat did pick up other people (read: drunken loud-mouth douchebags) on the second night while we were dumped on CatBa Island. Although I did enjoy CatBa Island, it would have been nice to spend 2 nights on the boat.

The caves are great, very busy, but nice to see. Not ‘stunning’ however. The best view we had the entire time was when we went kayaking through a small cave where boats couldn’t go.

Waiting at the dock was a bit shite. But the bus ride was pretty comfortable (specially if you’ve ever crossed the boarder from Thailand to Cambodia).

We visited Ha Long Bay in 2002, mid way through a year teaching English in Southern China. We arrived there after a rotten trip to Hanoi and it was a breath of fresh air. We booked our trip through the Kangaroo Cafe in Hanoi and I highly recommend doing it this way. We had a lovely clean and comfortable minibus from Hanoi, a great lunch on the way and a very smooth transfer onto our “junk” for the bay tour.

Our “junk” was a modern replica of the older boats doing the bay trade. It was all polished timber, beautiful dining room, fabulous top deck and a great crew who really looked after us. The sleeping quarters were tiny and airless, but it didn’t matter because most of us dragged mattresses onto the top deck and slept in the “1000 star hotel”.

Our tour of Ha Long Bay took us to some great photo spots, temples and swimming spots. The food on the boat was nothing short of incredible. We enjoyed ourselves thoroughly.

I would like to make a boat trip on the Halong Bay and moving through its 3000 odd limestone islands. The tiny islands are dotted with beaches and grottoes created by wind and waves, and have sparsely forested slopes ringing with bird tunes.