Jan 31st Hanoi – Ha Long Bay

Jan 31st Hanoi – Ha Long Bay

Moving kumquat trees around....

An early start this morning as Quang and Trang wanted to get going before 08:00. The drive to meet the boat for the cruise was going to take about 4 hours. Looking at our map it showed a motorway most of the way so I surprised to hear that about 160kms was going to take so long. The reality is that yes, it’s a two lane highway, but it’s full of motorbikes, over laden lorries, coaches and cars and therefore very slow moving with lots of honking of horns. The weather is low cloud and I expect that will continue for some days which is a real shame, but we can’t change it so we’re hoping for dry.

Along the road it’s a mixture of rural paddy fields and cultivation and urbanization which consists of shops, workshops, homes, karaoke bars, builders yards and restaurants. Occasionally there are markets selling kumquat, mandarin and peach trees, these are to decorate the home to celebrate Tet. Tet being the Chinese New Year that starts on Feb. 8^th. There are rivers and the land is very flat with the occasional hill. Not too surprising given that this is the delta of the Red River.

We’ve just stopped at the equivalent of a shopping outlet. You get out one side and walk through to the other. In between its silk clothes and other goods, carvings, lacquer work, leather work, alabaster work, etc.. Tamsin and Kim both bought silk shirts.

Just before we got to the boat we stopped at a pearl farm. We were shown how they form the nucleus of the pearl using Mother of Pearl and insert it into the live oyster. Two years later they harvest the pearl which sadly means the pearl dies. We were then shown how they grade them by colour, clarity and uniformity.

Halong Bay

Quang and Trang dropped off at the offices for the company we’re using for the cruise, Bayha. All but three of the 20 cabins are being used today. As we waited to board groups of English, Australian, Japanese and , I think, Indian gathered. We left port bang on 12:45 as we were finding our cabins. Kim in 206 and us in 207. The cabins are superb with teak floors and bamboo screens on the walls and a large window. The boat glides serenely through the water at a leisurely pace. There are plenty of other boats around us heading in roughly the same direct. The rocks rise up steeply from the water to about 100-150m or so. They’re covered in vegetation which varies from trees down to ferns etc..

The archway we were rowed through

We’re called to the top deck restaurant for a safety briefing and introduction to the crew. After which it’s lunchtime. This is a rather splendid hot and cold buffet. After which we have about an hour before the first activity visiting the caves. We all go up top and agree that despite the weather it is spectacular. We spot what we think are Kites as they seem to just glide around without much effort. Around us we can see in between the islands fisheries and markers for pots and some boats that look like motorized baths chugging around.

We stop amongst a group of other boats and are tannoyed to the lower deck and the tender which will take us into a bay where there are traditional rowing boats (bath tubs) that we get into to visit the cave. We’re rowed into the cave and along the way notice how shallow the water is, about 2m. The cave is actually a tunnel as it takes into the next bay. There have been some impressive stalagmites that have been broken, maybe to get to the other side.

Happy hour is at 17:00 and runs to 18:30. In between there is a cookery demo of how to make Vietnamese Spring Rolls. Kim carried away the International Honours for Spring Roll rolling taking on challengers from Australia, Canada, Japan and German for the Bayha 2 competition. Then it’s dinner. It’s a tough life!