"Loving Chickens" islands in Ha Long Bay. Ha Long Bay has thousands of islands, each taking on a different shape. Overtime, people have named them for what they look like.
From Hanoi we caught a bus at 8am from our hotel to Ha Long Bay. We signed up for a tour with ODC travels but ended up with Vega Tours somehow. In the end we had a great time so we didn't really care which boat we were on, haha. During our bus ride I finally saw my first torrential downpour (excepting the one I was caught in for 5 minutes). It rained and it rained. For the most part our entire Ha Long Trip was cloudy if not raining but we have missed the rain so much we really didn't mind.
Our bus arrived to the harbor and we got on a smaller boat which took us to our bigger boat. The boat was so much more than we had expected it to be. The dining room was nicely set and had furniture that wasn't plastic. The bedroom was air conditioned and had a nice bathroom as well as a beautiful view. The upper deck had a dozen wooden pool-deck-like chairs (not sure what those are called) for lounging. And to top it off, we were sharing the boat with 9 people who were all really cool.
There was a Australian/French couple that was living in Tokyo, a couple from the Netherlands, a couple from France, a couple from a Spanish speaking place that we didn't really talk to because they didn't really speak English, and a girl named Deborah from Brazil who was traveling through southeast Asia by herself for one year. This was month nine for her. We learned a lot about the couples from Japan and the Netherlands as well as Deborah over the 48 hours we spent together. We were so happy to find that it wasn't a couples cruise because that was somewhat of a concern for us haha.
There was also a packed itinerary of fun activities for the tour including exploring a cave, kayaking, swimming, hiking a limestone island in the bay, and eating some really fantastic cooking. We ended the trip with a stop off at a fishing village where they farm pearls before heading back to the harbor. It was nice to enjoy a trip where we didn't have to make any decisions or do any planning. The trip was about $130 which covered our hotel in Hanoi, a night's stay on the boat, all of the aforementioned activities, and our meals. We felt like it was a good enough deal and certainly enjoyed our time. That's all for now, thanks for reading!
Walked around this cave. Vietnam has some of the largest caves in the world (not that this is one of them). This cave was called Hang Sung Sot or Cave of Awe.
View from the entrance to the cave.
Dusk
View from the top of the island we hiked up.
Greg talking to Deborah on the smaller boat attached to our ship.
View from the bow of the smaller boat.
Kayaking
Bedroom and Bathroom
Dragons on the bow of the ships are supposed to remind people of the legend that suggests the lime stone rocks were formed by a dragon swooping down and carving its way through the rock. They're also symbols of royalty.
Bow of the ship
Dining room
Cooking class with our tour guide, Tiger, an Australian/French couple that lives in Japan, and a couple I never really spoke to because they mostly only spoke Spanish.
Delicious food and the hike back down from the top of that mountain we climbed in the morning. I believe it was called Dao Tuan Chau.
Just another photo of the island.
Tiger showing us the oysters at the pearl farm.
Pearl farm. There are a lot of floating villages around where fishermen live.
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