We left for ha long bay early the next morning and discovered some rather interesting people were on our trip.....!! We got to the pier and onto the boat!! It was incredible as the weather was amazing so we lay on deckchairs on top of the boat and watched as the islands were all around us and there were thousands!! We stopped off at one to go into an amazing cave which was all lit up and some of the rocks were very odd shapes...??! after this we got back on the boat and then made our way to the floating village where you took kiaks to see some more of the islands!! We then got on the boat once more for our niht on the boat and managed to get caught smuggling in a bottle of wine as it was so expensive on the boat for our dinner so had to pay comission felt like being back at school!! we woke up the next morning to go to cat ba island where we found out we had to **** up a vertical hill which we hadn't signed up to......!! there were thousands of steps and tiny latters and finally just some rocks but the view was amazing although going through all the mosquito areas and falling over several times may not have been quite worth it??! we then went to our hotel before taking a short trip out to monkey island where sarah and martha managed to completely capsize but there was a nice beach and some monkeys to be seen. That evening we went out and discovered a table footbal which was fun and met some americans who made some rather rude comments..... although they were rather amusing) we also bumped into the the following evenig to our dissapointment!! the next day we got back on the boat for a final sunbathe before heading back to hanoi!! sadly having to say goodbye to our boating friends with their interesting beirds and complaints!!

we arrived back in hanoi and met the others for dinner which was really nice and then went onto funky monkey where sarah found a friend and then the funky buddah!! The following day we went to see some vietnamese water puppetry and then went to the cinema as there was a storm outside!! Sarah and i then went back to the funky monky before going to a street restaurant to meet some locals. it was marthas last day the following day we all went out for lucnch before saying goodbye and getting on our sleeper bus (with bunkbeds 3 across) for a father sleepless night but amusing journey to hue!!

Hue was a cultural experience more than anything we went to the forbidden purple city and then took motorbike taxi's up to the emperors tombs it was interesting, we then watched several films as we were exhasted and had to get up for the bus at 7 this morning!! We have now arrived in Hoi An...