Cat Ba Island (Thurs 3rd December)
After a very good nights sleep on the junk boat, we headed onto deck for breakfast which was superb. We headed off nice and early to Cat Ba island, the biggest island in Halong Bay, and one of the only one’s that is inhabited. 50% of the island is National Forest.
We were due to do a trek into the National Forest in the morning, so we caught a bus to the drop off point. What we didnt expect, was to be doing the trek with about 100 other tourists. The trek was up a very steep small mountain/big hill where in many places, there was no room to pass if there was one person going up and another going down. The trek was a tad on the ridiculous side too. In places it was up sheer rock faces, with sketchy vertical ladders and sheer drops on either side of you. There was no pre warnings about the trek, not even to wear walking shoes. Some of the older tourists were really struggling and caused a huge back log, whereas others were in flimsy flipflops and struggling with foot holds. But when you got to the top, the view was incredible. There was a 360 degree view of the island and mainly the peaks of all the mountains in the national park. The peak of the mountain we were on was very dodgy, as there were so many people trekking up to it, there was not enough room on the rock at the top for everyone to stand. There were no safety barriers to hold us in, and I’m not gona lie, I was a tad scared!
The focal point at the top was a very rickety old 100ft high watch tower. It had a limited to 5 persons at the top at any one time. However, our guide was telling us all to just go up there regardless of the limitation. Well, as you can imagine, there was a good reason for the limitation, the watch tower at the top had some very interesting wooden planks and it was actually swaying at the top. Naomi got most of the way up the steps to it, but as soon as she found this out, bolted straight back down again!!! Chris stayed up the top long enough to get some good pictures.
The thing that made our group laugh the most on this trek was our guide. She was 60-70 year old woman in flip flops who didnt even break a sweat. She encouraged us up to the top of the watch tower when we should have stuck to the limitation, but as soon as we started climbing the stairs to the watch tower, we later discovered that she bolted back down the mountain!!!! Hmmm, slightly worrying! When we finally found her at the bottom having a drink, she didnt have a clue who her group were, and was just greeting everyone. She would never have known if everyone made it off that mountain!!!
Anyways, after our mountain venture, we headed to Cat Ba town, which is the main town on the island. It is a resort in the high season for the Hanoians to get away from the heat of the city. But as it was low season, the place was absolutely dead. We reckoned the design for the sea front was based on a Spanish/English beach resort with its flashy lights and high rise hotels.
View of the harbour and the floating town within the harbour!
We had a free afternoon to explore whatever we wanted, so we decided to find the beaches, but take the coastal route to them. There were 3 beaches, which were originally named Cat Co 1, 2 and 3, and the strangest thing is, they were in no particular order too!?!? The first beach that we came to was Cat Co 3. It was linked to the only resort hotel on the island, however it was not owned by them so anyone could venture onto it. And what a beauty it was. There was no one on the beach except us and the beach cleaner (who was clearing away pebbles, and later on our footprints!!!). We chilled out in this beauty spot for a while, until the next tourists came to ruin the serenity lol!
The route round to Cat Co 1 was on a very well crafted cliff path. Chris was admiring the handy work of the craftsmen who had made the balustrade. They managed to make concrete look very much like tree stumps and branches, very clever.
Various pictures of Cat Co 1 beach.
After venturing round to each of the other beaches, which were not as impressive as the first, we made our way back to town, just in time to see the sunsetting over the harbour. A very very beautiful sight.
Our guide had organised a meal for us all in the restaurant next to our hotel. It was absolutely superb. Lots of fresh seafood, and very nice dishes for the special ones who don’t like seafood (Chris, cough!!). Although we had spent a day with our fellow boat travellers, it was the first proper opportunity to gather some stories and enjoy each others company.
We all enjoyed the meal, some of our friends enjoyed a massage during the meal too, but we headed on to what appeared to be the only bar open in town. And funnily enough it was full of all the tourists we had seen on the trek in the morning. As the drinks were stupidly cheap and buy one get one free, Chris and I did what we do best, and introduced a drinking game. Oh dear. There were a couple of casualties…… Piers and Chris stitched each other up a lot. At one point in the night, we werent allowed to say each others names, point, swear, say the words drink or take, we had to drink left handed with our pinkie finger extended and worst of all, YOU WERE ONLY ALLOWED TO TALK IN AN ACCENT different to your own. Oh dear did it all go terribly wrong! Paula was very impressive, she managed to still be part of the games even though she was only on water! But at 11.30pm when we left the bar, the whole town had shut down, and it was only us around. This is one thing about Vietnam, they love their early nights and curfews.
Friday 4th December
I will be very brief with this day as nothing exciting happened :(
We travelled back from Cat Ba Island to Halong Bay harbour nice and early. Had a terrible lunch in a banquet hall with hundreds of other travellers, before embarking on the horrible journey back to Hanoi.
We had pre-arranged a open bus ticket to take us that night to Hue, the next major city down the Vietnam coast. However, it was 14hours away. So we went overnight by coach to Hue, on a sleeper coach with beds and everything. It wasnt luxury but it was an experience. And at $40US for a one month open bus ticket to Ho Chi Minh (Saigon), can’t really complain!
Naomi and Chris
xxxx
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