Just got back from Halong bay and have to say we had an excellent time. Halong Bay is this incredible series of mountains in turquoise water that are almost always partly shrouded in mist. Spent two days and one night on a luxury wooden boat crusing around the bay and exploring a cave or two. Food and accomodation was all inclusive and the whole thing set up back only $27 dollars! I aim to do whitsundays in OZ later in the year, but it will have to go some to beat this! Being the only backpackers on our mini bus from Hanoi to Halong bay and seeing that everyone else was a vietnamese couple, we were somewhat glad to have met two lovely german girls on board our boat (hey consi and stella). Together with an aussie we met (joel) and a cool french/german couple, we spent most of the day and night swimming in the bay and jumping off the boat. The food on board was excellent and many a tiger beer was had! Tommorow woodsy and i are to catch an overnight train to a place called sapa (near the vietnam/china border). The aim to do some trekking and meet some Vietnamese hill tribes : )