Halong Bay: Exceeding Expectations
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Begin researching a trip to northern Vietnam, and two things will become clear: You should go to Halong Bay, and you are likely to be disappointed by your trip. Guidebooks and the Internet abound with horror stories from overnight cruises in the karst-filled bay. Admittedly, most of the problems are with insanely low-priced budget tours, but it is hard to separate the wheat from the chaff. We decided to spend a bit more money ($106) and warily signed up for a three-day tour with Vega Travels. We were prepared for the worst, but ended up with what, if not the best, was very, very good.
Vega picked us up in Hanoi (where we stayed at the expectations-beating Little Hanoi Hotel) and whisked us, along with three more travelers, to Halong City. It was a cloudy, drizzly day, but the docks were still jammed with tourists boarding dark wooden junks. As our small group sailed into the bay, we could see karsts in every direction. It would be a perfect setting for a film version of the Odyssey — we imagined the sirens on one karst and Scylla flinging her arms towards us from another.
We saw the main “sites” — the Surprising Cave and Ti Top Island — on the first day, but the real highlight was sitting on the junk gazing out on the beauty that passed us by. In better weather, the top of the boat would have been the perfect place to lounge, take photos and soak up the atmosphere. But our luck had run out after three warm days in Sapa. We spent most of the trip inside the cabin, alternately loving the windows for the view and cursing them for the drafts.
On the second day, we went trekking on Cat Ba, which is the largest and only inhabited island in the bay. Halfway through our slippery hike through the jungle, we stopped to rest at the home of an elderly Vietnamese man. He and his wife subsist by fishing one of Cat Ba’s lake and keeping flocks of chickens (and the dogs to protect them). As we ate oranges from his trees, our guide explained that he was a Vietnam War veteran who returned home from the war too late in life to have children. So they still live alone, a short hike away from the island’s main road. The travel agency has given them a loan to help them expand their fishing operations and hopefully amass a nest egg in case they need to move to the city later on. In exchange, they give tourists a chance to see something far removed from the rest of the luxurious cruise experience.
After the trekking, a short kayaking trip got me sufficiently wet that I was willing to brave the cold waters for the sake of saying that I swam in Halong Bay. (I couldn’t quite manage to jump off the roof of the boat, however.) We spent that night on a hotel in Cat Ba and the next morning, the boat took us back to Halong City. It was a relaxing three days, spent with excellent company, and helped us recharge our batteries for a rapid swing through central and southern Vietnam.
Written from the road in Hoi An, Vietnam. Subscribe to my RSS feed for more stories and come back in February for photos!
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