In order to reach Halong Bay, we had to start by taking an overnight bus from Phong Nha to Hanoi, which was uneventful and normal in most/all respects (i.e., the seats were mostly uncomfortable, the ride was uncomfortable, the driver drove like a madman and we barely slept). The notable issue is that the bus arrived in Hanoi at 5am – a full two hours earlier than planned. [Editor’s note: normally, arriving anywhere early is a plus, but when nothing is open and you don’t even have a hotel lobby to sit in because you’re heading straight on out of town, it’s a little inconvenient.] Groggy and discombobulated, Jess and I were left to wander around Hanoi at this hour until our shuttle ride to Halong Bay at 7:30am. It was an interesting time to be in the city that I think we really appreciate with hindsight. Hanoi is normally known for its incredibly frenetic traffic filled with motorbikes zipping everywhere, whereas at 5am we would walk through the dark streets with hardly any vehicles around. Amusingly, the lake in the old quarter of Hanoi was lined with older Vietnamese citizens who were doing early morning Tai Chi and other calisthenics exercises. There wasn’t another westerner in sight and it was interesting to see this alternative, local side of the city.
5:30am calisthenics in Hanoi
6:30am, in The Note Café, the earliest place that opened in the area (and a very cool spot!)
We bided our time at a park bench around the lake until the earliest cafes opened at 6:30am, at which point we parked at them and waited for our tour agency to open so we could catch our 3-4 hour long shuttle ride to Halong Bay. Once we made it to the bay, we were whisked through the dock and led to a small boat which would take us to our boat for our three day, two night cruise on Halong Bay – the Calypso Cruiser. We chose this boat after doing a somewhat exhaustive search of options on a useful aggregator site. Additionally, we chose three days for our cruise (instead of the alternative two days/1 night) because Halong Bay was supposed to be one of the highlights of our time in Southeast Asia and we figured it’d allow us to go deeper into the bay to explore some of the 2000+ limestone karsts that dotted the waterscape.
[Editor’s note: Halong Bay was always one of the highlights of Southeast Asia we’d heard about as a must-do. The guides even told us it was one of the “new Wonders of the World”, whatever that means. It’s a bay filled with steep limestone mountains popping up out of the water everywhere, and in all the pictures on google at least, it’s always gorgeous and sunny. We quickly learned that those pictures were not taken in December, as it was overcast, gray, and cool the entire time we were there.]
The gray and crowded dock where all the junks and cruisers board for the Bay
We boarded the boat, which was modest in appearance and only contained 16 cabins, and discovered that we would be sharing our first evening with an older group of 10 Singaporeans, as well as a couple from India and two travelers from Spain. We ate a delicious lunch and had a minute to gather ourselves upon arriving before we whisked away to our first activity: visiting a nearby floating village. We opted to explore the village by a bamboo boat paddled by a local villager, since kayaking sounded hard and we would be doing a separate kayak tour the next day. The floating village was somewhat interesting, but a bit strange to visit since in 2014 the Vietnamese government ordered the 200+ inhabitants of the village to resettle onto the mainland. The resettlement will be finalized in 2020 and roughly half of the original villagers still remain, but it made for a slightly weird and ominous, half-abandoned viewing experience. [Editor’s note: it was pretty but also incredibly crowded with tourists, as apparently every single tour boat stops there at the exact same time in the afternoon. Why don’t they spread it out a bit? Who knows.]
Part of the floating village among the karst mountains
Hello from the bamboo boat
The bamboo boats and kayaks all flowing through the village
A ship in the fishing village
A bamboo boat heading toward a natural rock bridge near the village
One of my favorites: a tiny floating dog house with its occupant in Halong Bay
We finished the floating village tour by visiting a nearby “pearl farm” where they kept different types of oysters for the purpose of cultivating pearls to sell. It was simultaneously kinda interesting and kinda strange, since we were looking at beautiful strands of pearls on a boat in the middle of Vietnam. Not the type of scene that normally comes to mind for such a thing. [Editor’s note: think half precarious wooden platforms with peeling paint and fishing nets scattered around, and half immaculate air conditioned pearl jewelry showroom with expensive prices and staff in suits. So bizarre.] We returned to our cruise ship and enjoyed a brief “cooking class” where we learned how to roll spring rolls (a deceptively difficult task given the delicateness of rice paper) and then yet another fabulous, multi-course dinner. For whatever our qualms with the cruise experience, the food was really top notch. It was also enjoyable to chat for the evening with our new Spanish and Indian friends, since such multicultural interactions provide a sort of “travel” within our actual trip. Finally, we ended the evening fishing for squid off the side of the boat by using chicken as bait (what they eat in their natural habitat, right?) and bamboo sticks with strings attached to the end as fishing poles. Surprise, surprise: we didn’t catch anything. Shocker.
The Pearl Farm among the karsts near the floating village
A local woman paddles past tourist boats
The view from our home sweet boat, and also the site of squid fishing
Spring roll rolling class
Rorie working on his roll form
Why yes, this IS a hollowed-out jack-o-lantern style pineapple with spring rolls stabbed into the sides!
The next day all of the passengers from the boat (except for us) checked out and made their way back to Hanoi, since they only had a 2D/1N tour. Alternatively, we were picked up by smaller boat and taken to our excursion for the day: kayaking and swimming in the bay. We were joined by a Brazilian/Chinese family of four and set off to a comparatively remote spot in Bai Tu Long Bay (next to but not as crowded as Halong Bay) to kayak. In the ultimate test of our relationship and compatibility, Jess and I were given a two-person kayak and were forced to navigate it through the karsts to various beaches and viewpoints. With minimal arguing and bloodshed, we actually made a great team as we smoked the poor family that included two kids and had never kayaked before. [Editor’s note: I was unaware that this was a competition, but quickly learned that everything is a competition and we had to be the best at two-person kayaking.] We took the time to kayak into various small caves that lined some of the karsts and stopped at sandy beaches to relax a bit and have rock/coral/shell skipping competitions. All in all, the kayaking was a nice activity and a good chance for us to be active. The problem, which persisted all of our days on Halong Bay, was that it was overcast outside, windy and cold, often making it unpleasant to be on the dock of the boats or to enjoy the chilly water. Thus, all of us refused the swimming activity and instead spent the afternoon after lunch just napping on the boat (with our legs/feet wrapped in towels, since they were cold) while it made a leisurely return to our main cruise ship.
Selfie from our kayak!
Upon returning to our cruise ship on the second afternoon we met a new group of guests on the ship, which comprised of a group of 14 folks enjoying a two week tour of Southeast Asia together and an Australian couple. Clearly, this was a weird contrast. The cruise made sure to exacerbate this divide by setting up the dining room for dinner so that one side of it had a massive table with 14 place settings, while the other side of the room contained a small table with merely four place settings. So awkward. Fortunately, the Australians were delightful folks and were able to enjoy the evening chatting with them the whole time about a range of issues over dinner. The icing on top of the cake of the strangeness was when the large group decided to bust out karaoke after dinner on our fairly compact cruise ship, which meant we had the pleasure of listening to them belt out renditions of “Hit Me Baby One More Time!” and “Like a Virgin” all the way in our cabin. Fantastic.
Nighttime on Halong Bay
Boats dot the horizon at night
The next morning we were awakened early to checkout of our hotel room and join our last excursion of the tour to a nearby karst to enjoy a “hike” (it consisted of a whopping 100 stairs) and to visit a tiny cave (which had two caverns and was smaller than some houses in Salt Lake City/Seattle). Okay, it probably wasn’t that bad objectively, but we had become hiking and cave snobs after our time in Phong Nha and the contrast was stark. We were also forced to deal with hordes of tourists from other cruise ships on the narrow steps to/from the cave, so on the whole it was a “meh” experience. We then returned to our boat for “brunch” and to begin our leisurely return back to the dock so that we could catch a shuttle to Hanoi that afternoon. [Editor’s note: I’m not sure how I feel about being a “cave snob,” but it’s definitely a real phenomenon as it turns out. Pretty views, though!]
If you use enough instagram filters, it almost looks like a sunny day!
From the beach near the cave hike
A panorama of the bay from the top of our boat
Ultimately, we were both pretty disappointed by our cruise on Halong Bay. There was nothing specifically bad about the cruise ship/crew itself, but I think it was an issue of expectations. All the pictures we saw of Halong Bay depicted it as incredibly beautiful, once-in-a-lifetime destination which was basically paradise. While we haven’t always been certain about where we were going to go in Southeast Asia, we had Halong Bay circled as a true highlight of our time there. Instead, we were here during the Vietnamese winter, so the weather was overcast and cool the whole time. That not only prevented us from enjoying the water activities or sitting on the deck of boat during our down time, but it robbed us of the types of jaw dropping views and beauty that we had come to expect. [Editor’s note: I completely agree – the boat made no attempt whatsoever to adjust the itinerary for the season or weather, so they would tell us “time for swimming now” and then when no one wanted to because of the cold, they would just say “ok, you can sit on the boat then.” In addition, the entire experience felt extremely scripted and like a conveyor belt of tourism where every boat does the exact same things in the same order at the same time, meaning that we were surrounded by tourists and shepherded through the experience without any say in it. Not how we like to travel, and combined with the sub-par weather, a disappointment for something that had been built up so much.] It was still a generally pleasant cruise experience and chance to relax on the water, but we generally decided that it just wasn’t worth the cost of the cruise. A bummer overall, but it happens. Any disappointment is definitely offset by some of the more “off the radar” sites we’ve seen that either took our breath away or were supremely fun and memorable, proving that you don’t have to win them all as long as you win a lot of them (and trust me, we definitely have!).
Heading back to the dock under (still) cloudy skies
