Palmira is going on a 2 months trip to Sout East Asia. She is sharing her experiences and adventures with us :)
You can avoid booking a tour from Hanoi to Halong Bay and spend your time in Cat Ba island but if you really want to see the Bay you have to hire a boat that takes you there. Rasmus and I were determined to spend a night on the boat sleeping between the mountains. We were looking for the most independent tour in Cat Ba Island, without many tourists on the boat and avoiding the most common places where the tours take you. And in the end, we found it although with some complications in the last minute as we were used to in Vietnam.
We started the two days tour with other five tourists who only had booked the one day tour so that meant that we were going to be the only ones on the boat during the night. There were some activities during the day: we visited the most famous caves (not very impressive if you´ve seen the ones in Spain), we did kayaking, we swam in different places in the bay and of course, we enjoyed the stunning landscapes that were surrounding us during the whole trip.
The problem came when we were going to be separated from the rest of the Group. Another boat appeared to take the others back to Cat Ba Island. When we found out that we were going to sleep on the boat that had taken us around all day, probably the oldest one cruising around the bay, we got really angry. The owner of the tour company had promised us that we were going to sleep in a sailing boat and this one was far away of being one. After a long and heated conversation between Rasmus and Mr. Tuan (the owner) we got the sailing boat as promised. It was amazing being on the boat just the two of us and the crew who were very kind to us. They prepared us a great meal on the roof of the boat and they helped us to put the mattresses in the best place of the boat, where we could sleep under the clear sky.
You couldn´t ask for a more romantic night although we couldn´t sleep very well at last:
1) we could hear the noise coming from the karaoke of another boat in another part of the bay.
2) I was all the time afraid that Rasmus could fall off the boat if he rolled over the ground.
3) sunrise is at five o´clock in Vietnam.
The rest of the second day of the tour was curious. We went to an area where you can access a lake inside the cliffs at low tide and they took us with a small boat to enter through a narrow channel.
The lake itself wasn´t as stunning as we expected to be but we took a little tour around until we got back to the part where we entered. Getting inside was pretty easy because of the current taking us in. But now, we would have to go against the current to get out of there. It was almost impossible and the guy in charge had to get out of the boat to pull us, walking on the pointy shell covered rocks, cutting his foot… but in the end with a joint effort of everybody on the boat, we made it.
After that we had lunch and took us to the closest place in the bay to Halong city and transferred us to another boat filled of Vietnamese people singing karaoke where we met a few nice girls.
When we arrived at the port we looked for a taxi which could take us to the bus station but he was asking too much money for that as always.
The family that we had met on the boat heard it and offered to take us there by car. In the end, they got lost on the way and they left us in the middle of the highway with a group of people who were waiting for the bus to come that would take us to Hanoi. And instead of the comfortable and air conditioned bus that had taken us to Haiphong three days ago we ended up in a dirty minibus that stopped constantly to take passengers in and with a suicide driver. Four hours of hell that really made me being worried about my life.
Luckily we arrived in Hanoi in the end but, as usual in Vietnam, people tried to trick us again. All of a sudden, the bus stopped in the suburbs of Hanoi, everybody getting off rapidly. So we did the same to see that the people got on another bigger bus. When we tried to get on it, the staff of our bus told us that this was Hanoi and the trip ended here. Of course we knew that this was a lie and we insisted to get on the bus. After some resistance they agreed to take us and we made it to the city.
But we were compensated for all this after that horrible minibus experience. We arrived at the hotel that we had booked in advance and we were told that they were going to transfer us to another more luxurious room because they didn´t have any room left.
The next day, we woke up enjoying the clean and cozy room and we went to visit the Ho Chi Minh museum to get to know better the recent past of the country and at six o´clock we headed to the airport to take our flight to Bangkok.
Would you like to join us? Calling all seasoned backpackers!
Willing to share your hidden gems with your fellow backpacker enthusiasts?
If so, we’re willing to share our love in the form of some well-deserved cash!
Email us at backpackreporter@iwannagothere.com to learn more.
