Part 1 - Siem Reap
Part 2 (this blog) - Ha Long Bay
Part 3 - Battambang
Part 4 - Ho Chi Minh City
Part 5 - Sapa and Hanoi
Part 6 - Mekong Delta and Cu Chi Tunnels
So my second blog on this looks at Ha Long Bay, which was also one of my favourite parts of this holiday.
Lowlights:
Weather/Environment:
Accommodation:
We booked our cruise with Glory Legend Cruises, who organised the shuttle bus from our hotels (in Hanoi) to Ha Long Bay (about a 4 hour drive), the shuttle bus back to our hotels, and just gave us a really great time. The tour guide on the shuttle bus (Dat, AKA Peter) was super funny and friendly, and Mr. Le and Mr Pham, our guides on the cruise, were great, friendly, and knowledgeable. There is a set itinerary for you and whether or not you do a two-day-one-night or three-day-two-nights cruise, you will have a great time.
Overall:
If you are going to Vietnam, you will be committing an atrocious crime if you do not visit Ha Long Bay, one of the seven natural wonders of the world, with 1,600 islands in total.
Shuttle Bus from Hanoi to Ha Long Bay and vice versa
We were staying in a hotel in Hanoi, and our shuttle bus came to pick us up at 8am. They gave us a window of 7:30 - 8:00am and we were the second last group to be picked up, so I was pleasantly surprised that they were quite on time. It was hilarious to see Dat, our shuttle bus tour guide, literally leap out of our moving bus to run to the hotel to get the last couple on our bus.
The bus trip was about 4 hours or so, with a 30 minute stop at a pretty cool workshop where the workers have disabilities. They have everything ranging from textiles to paintings to wood sculptures to gemstone carvings. It was pretty amazing.
Dat/Peter was really friendly too, so he made the 4 hour ride a lot more entertaining that I thought it would be. He talked to us about Vietnam and some differences between Vietnamese culture and our own cultures, such as the number of bikes/cars in Vietnam, the cost of insurance and other prices, and the average salary, etc. It was pretty interesting and I could tell that he really enjoyed what he was doing, and he even seemed to have taken his own initiative with some of the things that he told us.
Unfortunately, on the way back he didn't really bring up anything new (or anything at all rather); my brother said that he could have asked us what we thought about the Bay and then given us more facts about it, since most of what we know about it has been Googled.
Glory Legend Cruise
After maybe an hour's wait at Ha Long Bay, we get onto our boat and get transferred to Mr. Le and Mr. Pham, our two leaders/guides. Just like Dat/Peter, they were very friendly, had great customer service, and were very knowledgeable about the Bay.
Once on board, you have some time to go to your room. There are two levels of rooms; the ones on the second level have balconies, and the lower level ones do not, however this isn't such a big deal because you can just step outside your door onto the side deck and it's still the same view.
The rooms were pretty good; they have a double bed, a bathroom, a separate shower and toilet all efficiently packed into a small space. The bed also was not as uncomfortable as I thought it would be; you can get quite a good sleep even though you are rocking in a boat.
After you get settled, it's time for lunch. The food was really great; every single thing on the menu was really good (and I'm a fussy eater, so that's saying a lot!).
I also noticed that there was a smaller boat attached to the back of the cruise in which all the workers ate their lunch.
After lunch, you chill on the top deck or in your rooms or whatever. The front of the boat was pretty cool to hang out in, and the top deck is a nice place to have a nap as you sail through the bay.
You will then notice some new people coming on board, and it's pretty weird because you didn't see them when you boarded the cruise, so did they just come out of nowhere to join you halfway?
Well, in actual fact, the whole operation is pretty crazy. These new people actually have already been on this boat for a day, and since they are doing a 2-night 3-day cruise, they left this boat in the morning to go on their second day of the cruise. While they were out visiting a quiet cave, the boat docked and picked up people starting their own cruise (such as my family), and then the original cruisers came back to rejoin the boat. These people will then continue with their cruise, as their last (3rd) day would be the same as our last (2nd) day since we would be leaving the boat at the same time.
I thought this was a pretty genius plan; it meant that they could efficiently have their workers do the exact same routine every single day, and they could also fit both 3-day cruisers and 2-day cruisers onto the same boat and therefore not waste money by having empty rooms on board.
Vong Vieng Village
This section was the highlight of my entire holiday. I loved this place so much, because it's a floating village!
People used to live here, but once the government made them live on the coast, it became more or less abandoned.
Some people still live here, but some of the houses have been made up for tourists specifically.
You get into bamboo row boats and the rowers row you through the village. You get to see the floating houses, tiny boats that some people live in, and have a beautiful view of the islands.
Everything here is so tranquil; you are in the middle of nowhere rowing through the bay; it is completely silent except for the soothing rhythm of oars hitting water.
The only downside to this was that you could see how tired the rowers were. I think our group was probably the last of the day, so of course they would have been really tired. We tipped our rower because we could see how much effort he had to put in (they had to fully stand up and thrust their upper body to be able to gain the power to row us, and mind you, there was one guy who was quite large on our boat).
But in the end it was a fantastic experience; it made you really appreciate nature, and it was so calming and soothing just listening to nothing but the sound of oar breaking water.
Cruise Activities
In the evening, before dinner, you get to kayak around the bay if you want.
This was really fun because you can go right up close to the islands and have a better look than you could on the cruise ship.
Some people have the option of swimming too, but I didn't do this because the bay water seemed to be really really cold.
The night activities were also really good. They have a cooking demonstration on how to make and roll spring rolls, and everyone can try their hand at it. It was pretty fun and the spring rolls actually tasted delicious. I don't know why or how they were so good, but there is actually a difference between these spring rolls and the spring rolls here in Australia.
There's also squid fishing! If you can catch a squid then they can even cook it for you to eat! I remember we caught a squid, but we didn't know what to do with it so we called one of the chefs and gave it to them to cook. After some time, Mr. Le appeared and we told him we gave the squid to the cook, and he said, "No! Don't give it to them! They will just eat it!" before running off to the cooks. When the cooked squid came out, we were all a bit suspicious of whether it actually was the squid we caught (since the squid we caught looked smaller than what was on the plate).
It was really fun, although it was quite hard to catch a squid. My dad caught one and another British guy caught another, but the rest of us were having a really hard time.
The only issue was that during the day and even at night you could see a lot of debris in the bay, which was quite sad to see. While we were squid fishing, we also saw really foamy dirty stuff pass by us and regular intervals. It looked like the workers had been washing the dishes and then dumping the dirty dishwater liquid into the bay, which definitely would not help the cleanliness of the bay at all. My mum even said that cruise ships should have nets or something along the sides of the cruise ship to trap incoming debris, that's how bad it was.
Also, my mum woke up for the sunrise on the second day however because it was so foggy she couldn't see anything (thank goodness I was too lazy to get up!).
Surprise Cave
On the last day of your cruise, you look at the Surprise Cave. It is quite a pretty cave, although I don't know if that's just because of all the pretty lights they shone onto the cave walls.
Mr. Pham was our guide through these caves, giving us some tidbits of information on certain rock formations (Ha Long Bay means the Bay of the Descending Dragon; and some rock formations even looked like dragons).
The Surprise Cave was so named because the discoverers found a small cave, which opened up to a large cave, and this large cave kept getting bigger and bigger, so much so that it gave them such a surprise they named it the Surprise Cave.
The only to this part of the trip was that there are a lot of crowds as several cruise and tour groups are coming through here. Therefore it is a little chaotic, quite rushed and a bit of a shock to you after relaxing on a tranquil cruise. The cruise workers do tell you though that for those on the 3 day 2 night cruise plan, the second day's itinerary consists of going to a smaller and more quiet cave, since less people are there.
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