Today we wanted to fit in as much outdoorsy activity as possible, as we had not really done any to this point, so a day tour (facilitated by our hotel) around the islands of Ha Long bay was the plan.

As usual, we woke up from the noisy poultry in the backyard. At 6:30 to the minute, the roosters would wake us up— mercilessly shouting their version of “cock-a-doodle-doo.” The spare lumber on top of the tin roofs would serve as their vantage point, reflecting their heritage as perching jungle-foul. Nobody could get close to them without setting off the alarm.

We ate at the underwhelming free breakfast provided by the hotel, and got on our bus, and eventually boat, to start the tour.

The first leg of the tour was a boat cruise around the rocky islands that make this area famous. Our guide, Ryan, was excited to tell us about the movies that were shot here— notably Tomorrow Never Dies and Kong: Skull Island.

Most of the other passengers on the boat were western students on long trips— either from a gap year or after quitting a job. Only one other American was on the trip. The Europeans and South Americans that we met all explained that because their tuition was either cheap or free, they had the freedom to take trips like this after college. That’s not to say that Americans can’t, but the freedom that this allowed clearly made this life-style much more attainable. It also turned out that a Norwegian that we met had dated a Minge, some long lost cousin. Small world.

The boat brought us to Monkey Island, not too far away from where we embarked. This island is notable for the monkey population, which terrified our guide. We ever only got close to one or two, but it was enough to keep him back.

The island offered a hike / rock-climb to the top. The path was a little dangerous— full of jagged rocks, hand painted signs, a one-person-wide path, and occasionally no obvious way forward. It would probably look a little different if ran by the national park service.

It was not a high vantage point, but the view from the top did offer (at least to me) vertigo-inducing views of the surrounding craggy landscape. A few photos later, and we were on our way down, made difficult by having to take turns with the other group coming up.

From Monkey Island, we took our boat to a floating kayak station near Bat Cave (with plenty of Bruce Wayne jokes, courtesy of yours truly), where our group rented some two person kayaks to paddle around in. If the view from the top  of Monkey Island was spectacular, the view from the water was more so.

 

 

Returning to our boat, we were served a lunch, catered by the locals. This tasted better than most of the western friendly restaurants that we seemed to find ourselves frequenting, and much better than the breakfast that we started the day with: fried egg rolls, squid and pepper kabobs, tofu, clams, and fish, and of course a can of the local lager.

For the last leg of our day-trip, we took a boat to a local cove, where the hosts encouraged everybody to jump off of the 4 meter high boat. This is not a dizzying height, but it was a fun jump. From the water, I swam to the nearby sandbar, where the sand was made mostly out of shells and coral. There were a few cave-like hollows into the rock, but nothing that went on for any distance. Supposedly, there was snorkeling available, but that was not made clear and we missed our opportunity.

With our day-trip over, we took our boat back to the harbor, then bus to the hotel. We luxuriated in an hour or two nap after the long day. Afterwards, we walked down the main road, looking for some Pho for our last night in Vietnam. After scanning restaurants from three menus, and being seated in another before hastily escaping, we found a small family run restaurant. Our Pho was delicious, and everything we had been looking for.

Walking back to our hotel, there was a dessert stand where we got a Banh Kep Thai Lan, essentially a crispy crepe, folded around sliced banana and mango, drizzled with sweetened condensed milk and chocolate sauce. It was a good substitute for Jessie’s birthday cake, which was sacrificed in the name of travel.