Halong Bay

Halong bay is just as majestic as the pictures show you. Even the fact that you're sharing the bay and the amazing limestone cliffs with 2000 other people in identical ''authentic'' Vietnamese junks doesn't dampen the gorgeousness. In fact it makes for some pretty nice photos. The 3 days we were there it was grey and cloudy, but that was OK - all the cliffs faded into the background in different shades of black and grey and the silky still water and the white sky made it feel like we were in a black and white photo. The only sad thing is the rubbish in the water, with so many people and boats that stay overnight the water is not the cleanest or clearest.

The first day we went on the boat we went to visit a cave which we can't remember the name of but that all our guide could say that it was 'the most fabulous massive cave, the most beautifulest'' and other similar variations when quizzed.

Begrudgingly it was massive, and probably one of the most ''faaaaabulous'' caves we have ever been too.

And it had possibly the coolest bins in the world placed in side it, penguins and dolphins and fish! Who would want to throw their rubbish on the ground when they could throw it in a cool bin like this?

That afternoon we went exploring the bay on kayaks.

That night after dinner there was karoke, that no one took up, or you could go squid jigging. Which Jon LOVED, he sat with the boats crew all night dangling and jiggling a bamboo rod with some string catching squid and even a crab which the boats chef cooked for him to eat.

Otherwise all 12 of us on the boat sat around talking, there ended up being a fair few Aussies and 5 of us from Melbourne alone.

The next day we had opted for a 3 day tour so we swapped boats and went to CatBa Island, which is a National Park (with 50 hotels and guesthouses). Our brochure said we had a 15km a bikeride (though some of us opted for a motobike ride), which ended up being maybe 6km there and back and a ''trek throught the jungle to an ancient deserted village'' which ended up being maybe a 400m walk through farmland to a not quite ancient -but- we'll -givem -points -for -the deserted-bit village. The frogs in the well were cool though.

After lunch on the boat it was to our hotel on CatBa for a free afternoon. So we walked to the beach which was surrounded by cliffs and felt almost European not to mention packed with people in the water. We walked around to a quiter beach to have a beer where they charged us for the honour of using their deckchairs. That night was fairly quiet as the hotel the tour put us at was brimming with package tour middle aged Europeans. Infact the whole island was overflowing with them, everywhere you looked. So we think CatBa Island is aimed more for their market then ours.

CatBa Bay

The next day was a boat trip back through Halong bay then back on a bus to sweet home Hanoi.