Wow, where to start? I flew into Hanoi, Vietnam five days ago and have crammed a ton of sightseeing and crazy experiences into just a few days. As soon as I got to Hanoi I realized that Tet - the Chinese New Year celebration - would be happening on the evening of the 25th, with celebrations continuing during New Years Day on the 26th. Knowing this, I booked my trip to Halong Bay so that I would be back in time to see the Doyles and be able to partake in the festivities in Vietnam's capital city. After catching a ride from the airport into the city with a lovely woman from Seattle, I had already fallen in love with Vietnam. In preparation for Tet, motorcyclists packed the streets with Quince and Orange trees strapped to the back of their bikes, red and gold banners and decorations adorned the streets, and the whole city was buzzing with excitement. I checked into a mini-hotel, booked the Halong Bay trip and found a quaint little French cafe for some colonial food on my first night.
The next morning I was up early and caught a bus to Halong City, where my Old Fashioned Junk boat would depart for Halong Bay - a Unesco World Heritage site full of limestone karsts. I chatted with a few fellow travellers on the bus and discovered that many people were doing different trips and had paid a wide range of different prices for what we assumed would be the same product. Once I reached the harbour I got onto an old wooden "Junk" boat, quite unlike the one in the picture that I had seen in the brochure. I was trying to keep a "No Expectations, No Disappointments" mentality, so I didn't mind too much, but one of the girls who had paid significantly more than me was quite upset about it. We had some mediocre-quality lunch and I got to meet some really cool people on board. The scenery in Halong Bay was incredible and despite the cold, I really enjoyed sitting on the roof watching the islands drift past. The boat stopped at an extremely touristy cave, paved and illuminated with multi-colored lights. Our hilarious guide, Kenny, took the time to point out which stalagmites resemble male parts, dogs, people and various other shapes while I tried to play around with my camera to get some cool photos. From there we had the opportunity to kayak around the islands for no more than 20 minutes. It was nice to get away from the noisy and smoky boats all moored in one spot, but it was freezing cold outside and the sub-par kayaks left me soaked by the end of the trip. The food that evening was nothing to write home about, but again, just sitting on the roof with some Tiger beer & talking to some new friends in the evening was well worth the trip.
On Day 2 of the trip, the guests who had signed up for a 2 day/1 night cruise took the boat back to Halong City after dropping me and a lovely Australian family off on Cat Ba island. We met up with another group from another boat - a Party Boat full of Australian 20-something backpackers - and travelled to a little village at the base of one of the mountains. After a 40 minute hike, we scrambled up the summit to an extremely rusty tower teetering on the top of a mountain with amazing views. After hiking back down and some more waiting around, we were taken for a rather gross lunch in Cat Ba city. This supposedly busy little vacation town turned out to be an absolute ghost town, but we still had free time to wander the desolate streets there. After waiting around for quite a while after "free time," we climbed into a rickety old bus with a dozen Australian backpackers. They had successfully managed to find something to do in the 3 hours of free time - drink. The old bus immediately filled up with the stench of burning something and diesel fumes, so we had to open the windows (and thus, freeze) in order to breathe normally. Our crazy driver also hit and killed a goose on the way down the winding road, upsetting one of the Australian girls and leaving a mess of feathers behind us. Once at the pier, we were told (in limited English) that our boat had either run aground or broken down somewhere, and would therefore not be meeting us there. Freezing cold, I climbed into a little fishing skiff with the Australian family and we were driven to some other random boat in the Bay. We sat in the cold and waited over 2 hours before "Our Boat" (not the same boat) turned up.
We had another mediocre dinner and met some new travellers on the new boat, and our guide gave each of us a champagne glass full of rice vodka as some kind of consolation prize for suffering through the cold while we waited for the whole boat situation to be fixed. It certainly helped with the cold. Our guide and the crew had obviously gotten into the vodka before we had, and were into the Vietnamese Karaokee immediately after dinner. The high-pitched singing and kitchy music was entertaining for some time, but by 9 we were all exhausted and ready for bed... and the crew was not. The blaring Karaokee continued until nearly midnight, but I plugged into my iPod, curled up in my sleeping bag and managed to drift off to sleep at a somewhat reasonable hour. I was rudely awakened by vietnamese pop music at high volume from the dining room above my cabin at 6:30am, so was up early again. We headed back to Halong city and I tried my best to brave the cold and sit on the roof of the boat to take some photos. All of the chaos and disorganization of the tour distracted a bit from the scenery as I never knew what was going to happen next. We made it back to the city in one piece, however, and were even shuttled back to Hanoi earlier than scheduled. I'm glad that I got to see Halong Bay, but wish there was a better way to see it without the organized tour. On the plus side, I did get some great photos (coming soon, I hope) and met Russell - from the USA - who has been a fun travel companion for the past couple days. I got back into Hanoi in the afternoon, secured a place at a hotel for a reasonable price and got ready to go celebrate Tet, which merits a post of it's own...
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