Halong Bay

A very early start but unfortunately no water so showers weren't available so killed time watching the end of Argentina v Ivory Coast. Two people from our hotel were going on the tour too: a Brazilian couple called Fernando and Shana who are, if memory serves me, the first Brazilians I've ever met. We were picked up by minibus and joined four Norwegians (Daniel, Tyler, Hanna and Jeanette), a German (Annika) and a South Korean (Maisy). It was about a three hour trip which was split by a shop with every other travel bus for breakfast and a craft shop.

I changed seats for the second half of the trip and sat next to Fernando and Shana and we talked football all the way there and I impressed them because I've heard of Garrincha (Did you know Garrincha wanted to buy a radio during the 1958 World Cup in Sweden but decided not to because he could only ones that spoke Swedish?).

We arrived at the harbour to find about 80 Junks all waiting. Our guide, Bac (pronounced Buck) sorted our tickets out and we climbed on board our Junk. It had three levels - the bottom was cabins and the middle deck was tables for chatting and eating. There was also a roof terrace with deckchairs for sunbathing.

We had a little dilemma when Bac wanted all our passports and I, and three of the four Norwegians had left them back in the hotel (no-one told us we needed them!!) and this delayed our departure for about half an hour but then Bac 'borrowed' some passports. I never found out my new identity!! We eventually got going and heading off into Halong Bay. Didn't bother us too much as we'd found the Esky full of beer.

It was very nice sitting on the top deck with a beer as we cruised through the islands (there are supposed to be about 3,000!) although I confess that a mixture of the beer, sun and lack of sleep the night before meant I fell asleep. Nice sleep though!

I woke up in time for our first stop which was the Hang Sung Sot Caves (or the 'Surprising Caves' as they are known). They were well lit up but we'd seen plenty of caves on the trip so it wasn't that amazing. Although it did have a rock shaped like a penis which was lit up.

We headed back out among the islands and stopped somewhere (all the islands kind of look like one another) for swimming and kayaking. I didn't have the courage to join in the others jumping from the top of the boat but I was the only one (with Maisy) to take the Kayaks out. I had to teach her to paddle properly but she got the hang of it by the end! We circled the small bay before heading back cos she thought we were going to get attacked by sharks.

We headed to where we were going to spend the night and joined all the other boats. On the way Dave, Fernando, Shanna, Annika, Maisy and I sat up top and chatted. In keeping with Dave's favourite subject content (Famous Canadians) we had to come up with famous Brazilians, Germans (remember Hitler was Austrian!!), Brits and South Koreans. We didn't do so well with South Koreans and my contribution was mostly footballers. OK entirely footballers.

We had dinner about 7 and it was another stretch or starve occasion. Vietnamese spring rolls have been a surprise - have to find somewhere to get them back in Bristol! Unbelievably we managed to get some TV reception to watch the Dutch play Serbia. Annika, who didn't watch the game, reported that there was cheering from all the other boats when the goal was scored!

The following day saw an early start to the morning as the sun was shining in through the window. I sat up on the top deck enjoying the morning sun before Fernando and Shanna convinced me to go swimming. Very refreshing!!

After breakfast (French bread and jam again!) we were dropped off at Cat Ba Island with the four Norwegians. Everyone else was only on the two day tour and was heading back. We said our goodbyes and got packed into a minibus and drove along the concrete causeway onto the island. The causeway snaked its way along an estuary before heading up into the mountains.

The island was like something out of Jurassic Park with jungle and mountainous peaks and it was a fascinating drive. There was the odd settlement here and there. We passed a funeral on the way through. It was a procession of musicians and about 50 people. Unfortunately one of the ladies dressed in black collapsed and we waited while she was put onto a motorbike and driven back to her home. It was a very moving scene.

Our morning activity was a trek in Cat Ba National Park and we were dropped off with another group in the park. We joined an Australian couple (in their 30s) and three 60-somethings (two Aussies and a Brit).

We headed up into the mountains at a fairly steady pace with plenty of stops and eventually reached a ridge with great views both out towards the Bay and also into the island (further reinforcing the Jurassic Park comparisons). This wasn't the peak though and we had to climb down a way and then cut across. This involved a lot of scrambling over rocks and was fairly hard going. Not surprisingly we started to leave the old folk behind and when we got to the fork where one route led up to the peak and the other down, they started to head on down while we aimed for the peak.

The scrambling became even harder at this point and we also discovered some HUGE spiders. I hate spiders. Especially big ones! We came to a false peak but we couldn't find the route further up but after climbing a bit of the way up we discovered it and headed upwards. Eventually we made it to the top. The view was brilliant - a 360 degree view of the island from the forested interior, Halong Bay, inlets in the island and a small fishing village below us.

We headed back down and caught up with the rest of the group about half way down. By this point there was not a single space of clothing on my body not soaked in sweat and it started to get hotter the more we descended. I was not alone by any means!! We reached the bottom and found ourselves in the small fishing village we had seen from the peak. We were herded into a small cafe by our guide for some very welcome cold drinks.

The bus came to collect us and we were worried that there was no sign of our guide or our bags but there wasn't much we could do so we got on and were driven into Cat Ba Town. People were dropped off at various hotels along the way (and then picked up again to be deposited at the right hotel) and eventually we were dropped off at a hotel on the sea front to be met by Bac with our bags.

Had a quick shower in our room, where we discovered that we had only been given one double bed then down for lunch which was an identical meal to every other one we'd been served so far on our trip.

We decided to hire motos and explore the island and managed to get five motos (Jeanette wasn't driving). All our moto drivers drove us to the outskirts of the town, allegedly for 'police' reasons, but we suspect so they could fill up with petrol and make us pay. It was only 25,000 dong though (about 75p).

I remembered how to drive one fairly quickly although my down shift pedal didn't seem to work so well.

Our first stop was the Hospital Cave, which was a cave that had been converted into hospital and living accommodation during the American War. We were given our tour by a Viet Cong war veteran ('Officer!' as he kept telling us).

We climbed a steep stairway to small concealed entrance with a steel door at the back of the cave. This opened up an elaborate network of brick tunnels and rooms including bedrooms, wards, operating theatre, a meeting/singing room (we got a five minute rendition of a song which had the words 'Vietnam' and 'Ho Chi Minh' repeated ad nauseam to the same tune and clapping lots. It was excruiating by the end!), a cinema, a swimming pool and a secret tunnel to where a Gatling gun was mounted. What is more amazing is that the Americans didn't know it was there!

Our guide then showed us lots of pictures of him with various tourists so we had one with him and he made us promise to send it to him.

We continued up the island towards where we were dropped off but forked off towards Phu Long - a tiny fishing village. It was great driving through the countryside and along the coastline.

We passed through Phu Long and went right to the end of another causeway where there is a small ferry that links to the mainland. On our way back we stopped at Phu Long at a cafe which was really just a wooden balcony overlooking the river with small plastic chairs, a cooler and a keg.

We soon attracted quite a crowd as its not a tourist spot and they probably hadn't seen too many white people! Hanna and Jeanette in particular attracted a bevy of admirers who demonstrated with hand gestures what they couldn't in English about how beautiful they were, which embarrassed the pair of them no end. To be fair, they weren't getting any help from the rest of us who thought it was hysterical.

Despite trying to get our beers for free by leaving the girls, they only cost 5,000 dong each. We headed back to Cat Ba Town but couldn't find where we started and went to where we originally got the motos and managed to hand them over to their rightful owners.

On our return to the hotel we managed to get a room change so we had two double beds and a lot nicer room too. It was also three floors lower down which helped considerably.

Dinner was slightly different in that it had a squid dish and a fish dish meaning that Dave ate rice and chips but he wouldn't ask for anything else.

We headed to a bar called the Green Mango to watch the Australia game (although I had no idea that it was on) where I met a guy from Liverpool who had lived in Japan so I was supporting Australia and he was supporting Japan. Thankfully a three goal last seven minutes saw the Aussies home after a joke of a Japanese goal. He wasn't too bothered though because Cahill scored twice and he's an Everton fan.

Yet another early start the following morning mainly due to being woken at 5:45 by a foghorn. The Vietnamese certainly like their horns and were making a lot of noise at that time.

We had to leave early anyway to meet up with the boat to get us back to the mainland and breakfast was bread and jam again. We were collected at 8:20 and driven back through the island to the causeway.

It's all very well organised as everyone was shuffled onto the right boat. WE were joined by the Japanese loving Englishman and his mate who promptly slept the entire way back.

The rest of us sat on top and sun-bathed as we cruised between the islands. There weren't too many 2-days we joined though. We stopped about half way for a swim and, after Tyler jumped off the top deck, I summoned up the courage and jumped. It was only about 5/6m but very exhilarating. I did it a few more times too and we ended up doing tandem jumps for the cameras. I think we did five at the end at the same time.

We then headed back to the mainland although we were sitting inside by this point as the temperature gauge was hitting 37.

We got back to the organised chaos of the port and headed off to grab lunch at a nearby hotel, and all the other groups did the same. The air conditioning inside was very welcome!! Lunch was another identikit meal but Tyler and I polished off the Vietnamese spring rolls between us. They really are fantastic!

The bus ride back to Hanoi was fairly uneventful although the bus driver was one of the worst drivers in Vietnam and that's some accomplishment.

We dropped off everyone throughout the Old Quarter and eventually reached our hotel. Unfortunately they'd bollocksed up our train booking and we were on the 11 train instead of the 7. Allegedly there wasn't a 7pm train. Believe that and you'll believe anything!

They gave us a free room to have a shower and change then we wandered to bar street for dinner and a beer then we headed to the polite pub to watch South Korea v Togo. We saw two of the English guys from the Paraguay match who looked like they hadn't moved!! Chatted to one guy who had been in Hanoi four days and had done bugger all. Takes all sorts I suppose!

The hotel owner/manager arranged for a taxi to the train station and helped us get our bags on board and find our berths. Each cabin had four bunks and Dave and I had an upper and a lower berth.

We were settling in when our cabin mates arrived: two Vietnamese women and a small boy: grandmother, mother and son. I gave up the lower berth for them. We had a duvet and pillow and the beds were pretty comfortable. The Vietnamese ladies chatted a lot but eventually shut up!!