After a comfy nights sleep in our fancy boat cabin we went upstairs for our 7:30am breakfast. It was a buffet breakfast so we didn't have to sit at the fussy eaters table this time, and we've actually had sun today so it was a beautiful way to start the day, surrounded by many of the limestone rock islands.

Shortly afterwards we arrived at a pearl farm which was situated in the middle of Halong Bay somewhere. A guide took us around the various areas and explained the process of pearl farming very well. Apparently you don't just open an oyster and see if there's a pearl inside or not... there's an implantation in the oysters 'gonads' involved, and between 1-6 years of waiting (with the oysters in the water where they can feed on plankton) depending on the size/type of them. They also scan the oysters to see if/how a pearl is developing regularly. The pearls range from low to high quality depending on the colour and if there are any blemishes. Apparently only around 10-20% of the oysters produce pearls that can be used for jewellery because 50% do not produce any, and 20-30% do not produce good quality ones. Any that can't be used are ground down and used in things like makeup. The shells are shined and shaped into jewellery too and the actual animal part can of course be eaten, so there's hardly any waste product. It was a really interesting trip!

We got back on the boat and had to check out of our cabins at around 9:30am, and spent some time soaking up the sun and scenery on the top deck before our spring roll cooking class which was good fun. The ingredients were just rice paper, pork, carrot, onion, spring onion, mushroom and glass noodles. I definitely think I can re-create them back home!

We had lunch shortly after and an hour up on the deck before arriving back at the harbour where our bus picked us up for our 4 hour drive back to Hanoi's old quarter. It's really been an amazing 2 days, with our expectations exceeded in every way. Best part of Vietnam so far!