Our Junket

Junks lined up in the bay, sails down.
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Well the journal is called "Trains, Boats then Planes" so it was time for us to take a boat given that we'd missed out on the ferry to Kobe from Shanghai.

We booked a trip on a Junk boat to Halong Bay and Cat Ba Island so we could escape the bustle of Hanoi for a few days. Halong Bay is a Unesco World Heritage Site and we were looking forward to some lovely scenery.

spent an funny hour arguing over who it was that was making the kayak go in circles

On the top deck looking out on the bay.
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The journey to the port was very interesting, since we got a good look at the countryside and the architecture. The Vietnamese build very tall narrow houses with ornate balconies which makes a lot of sense in a city or town since the ground floor is generally a business. However in the country they build exactly the same type of house but there's no real need for it to be so narrow. Often just the front is painted leaving bare plaster on the sides. It's a bit odd.

We had to board another boat and jump from it to our Junk but once we got there it was lovely. We had a tasty lunch and then went up on deck to relax.

Limestone peaks at Halong Bay
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After a few hours we arrived at the imaginatively titled Surprise Cave - a large cave with various rock formations which if you try really hard as indicated by your guide, could possibly resemble various animals.  It was quite pretty but very touristy.

After that we sailed into another part of the bay and dropped anchor for a spot of swimming. This was bliss as neither of us had been swimming in the sea for about two years. We then spent the night on the boat, we tried to sleep on deck until it got too hot.

Cathal looking out to sea
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The next day we made our way to Cat Ba island. This island has a relatively small population, one of whom was to be our trekking guide for the day. He was 69 years old and put us to shame scrambling up the hills.  We walked about for a few hours and then retired to someone's garden and proceeded to eat all the fresh lycees we could lay our hands on. After that, we headed off to our hotel which had a lovely view, had lunch and promptly fell asleep! Lightweights!

We were awoken by the phone ringing and the receptionist telling us it was time to go kayaking. Blearily we made our way down to the bus, hopped on another boat and spent an funny hour arguing over who it was that was making the kayak go in circles! (It was Cathal, when I was solely responsible for navigation it all went a lot more smoothly!!)

Lovely scenery, Halong Bay
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We headed back to Hanoi the next day, and proceeded to look for a new hotel since our other one (which was really lovely) had lost our booking. It was a good trip and highly recommended.