Ha Long Bay

Our final and favorite destination in Vietnam was Halong Bay.

We arrived in HaLong, got one of the boats and the journey through bay was absolutely stunning. We were aboard a junk ship for two days in the bay famous for having nearly 2,000 karsts The bay was huge and covered in small uninhabited land formations or tiny islands rich in vegetation.

We sat up on the top deck on the wooden floor and floated through waters with jagged cliffs and islands surrounding us and that combined with a pineapple Ari had bought shaped like an ice cream made the whole thing quite great. We went past floating villages, a small floating house that was the local school, and people in row boats selling fruit.

After a few hours sailing into the bay, we got off our large boat to a smaller one and went through a small gap in one of the rocks to explore a private natural pool for a swim. Back on our large boat again, we moored up and explored the inside of one of the tiny islands. Once we walked through a tiny gap in the rock, it hollowed out into a huge cave system which we could walk around with stalagmites and stalactites everywhere.

Later we were back on our boat and had a lovely dinner with our tour friends, and all of a sudden the captain turned on the Karaoke. As it was 7pm and not one beer had been drank, everyone was a bit hesitant. A few Tiger Beers and vino later, everyone was fighting for the mic and anything went, from Aerosmith to Barbie Girl. We finally turned off the Karaoke after midnight and went for a cool down in the sea (which probably wasn't a good idea) but got told off by the guide anyway as it was so dark and boat kept floating away!

The night on the boat was a little restless due to a storm above us and monsoon. In the morning though, we woke up to an amazing misty view of Ha Long bay. It was quite eery.

In the afternoon we paddled kayaks through caves into hidden lakes and watched monkeys play on the rocks above us.