2011 February: Vietnam: Halong Bay

Travel Date: February 14, 2011 Destination: Halong Bay Valentine’s Day is the same date for my visit to Halong Bay, still cold at 10-12 degrees celsius. I booked this from the same Hotel. The guide picked me up at around 8.30am. It took us 2 hours before we reached our first stop for some refreshments. Aside from simple restaurant and high-priced biscuits and drinks, they also display a lot of local products (vases, bags and other woven items).



Again, another 2 hours before we reached the pier. We were re-grouped and separated from those having one, two and three day Halong Bay Tour.

We passed by the lime stones that formed to a dog, etc. We stopped at the fishing village were we took our lunch from our boats. Some of the locals are offering different fruits from their own version of floating market. Then we visited Sung Sot Cave (Cave of Surprises) – this is so beautiful in the pictures. But realizing what they have done to the cave is so interesting - it looks like man-made, but they claim it to be a natural resource. The stalactites and stalagmites are so dry, there were walk-ways for the tourists and they installed lights in between rocks. Did they cut-off some stones to do the walk-ways?

We reached the pier at 5pm in the afternoon, it was passed 8pm when we arrived at Hanoi proper. Additional Information: For those planning to take take a day tour or over night tour at Halong, kindly read this news article. The accident happened on Wednesday morning (2 days after I went to Halong Bay):

• http://business.inquirer.net/money/breakingnews/view/20110220-321297/Tourists-on-cheap-Vietnam-tour-paid-with-lives


• http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/a/-/world/8873410/vietnam-death-boat-owner-had-bad-record/