Halong Bay

Monday, March 16th

The day dawned clearer than the previous sunset suggested, and the new approach to rubbish in the Bay was already on show - "For a Green Halong Bay". We were told many times that our own boat company, the IndoChina Junk Company (oxymoron?) was determined to reduce rubbish throughout Halong Bay.

Indeed, it was clear enough and dry enough to have breakfast out on the middle deck.

But there were still sites to see:

And more relaxing to do as the crew set up the tables.

It's been a while since I had a "full English breakfast", and even longer for Prue.

We even got to sit at the front of the boat, or is that the bow?

Then we were moving again - it seems overnight moorings are restricted to a couple of lagoons, and each boat company has their own designated parking zones. There's also a safety element to this approach - I'm sure it can get a bit rough when the wind comes up.

As we headed to another place to stop, those kayaks continued to follow us around.

And every now and then there were fishing boats or fishing villages in protected backwaters.

The tender set off to buy lunch and/or dinner:

And we decided to go kayaking now that the weather had cleared a bit.

Who's the captain - the bow or stern?

Our guide showed us a cave, but this one wasn't deep enough to get very far into.

We were out for an hour and a half and did a circuit of a large island before returning via the tender to the mother ship for more relaxing, or eating, I can't remember which.

We moved again, this time heading towards our eventual overnight mooring.

Occasionally shadowed by another IndoChina Junk.

Visibility had improved, but the mist never really cleared.

And occasionally another current of rubbish passed by the boat.

After lunch we went kayaking again, this time ending on an island where the kayaks were collected and stored for the next group of tourists. In the background HMAS Dragon's Pearls raised her sails for the obligatory photo opportunity.

We were on a man made beach, owned and operated by the boat company - if the sun had been shining we might have even gone for a swim...maybe not.
 

We had been promised dinner in a cave, and that's what we got. On the same sandy island where the kayaks are stored, the company has leased a limestone cave historically used by fishermen as refuge and dwelling.

Nowadays, the interior is furnished, lit, and outfitted to produce "romantic" dinners for reasonably large groups of tourists. The crew even assembles to welcome everyone "aboard".

And uses a combination of electric and candle lights to produce a rather stunning effect.

Awwwww....

Even the pre-ordered drinks are carried from the boat - we had another bottle of Frog Chardy.

The food was delicious, much of it cooked on a BBQ located just outside a secondary entrance to the cave. There were even sculptured produced from sweet potatoes.

At the end of the meal, the crew sang a Vietnamese song, and each ethnic group represented among the passengers was asked to sing a typical "national" song - the Dutch version of Tulips from Amsterdam won the prize, not least because the three aging, hippy/bikey, tattooed Dutch men and women had done a lot of drinking and smoking up until now - what a contradiction they seemed to be.

We were soon ushered back to our tender and returned to the mother-ship. We reckon Rattus Rattus and his mates had a pretty good party after we left the cave that night.