Sittin’ in the Mornin’ Sun…

…I’ll be sittin’ when the evenin’ come

At this point, Shiv and I are train pros. We knew what to expect with Vietnamese trains so our sleep was more restful – especially since we got the whole cabin to ourselves. Score! And so we arrived to a very early, very dark, and very cold Hanoi. Pho was on our brains, so we scouted out the best place to get beef pho (chicken pho is mostly found in the South), Pho Bat Dan. Locals crowded this place, but we found a little table in the corner to enjoy our beef pho. I don’t know if it was the chilly morning temperature or the fact that we hadn’t eaten pho in 2 days (a lifetime it felt like), but this stuff just hit the spot. They had jugs full of white vinegar and red hot sauce on each table; we loaded up on both.

Satisfied, we headed out. By this time, the sun had risen and we got our first glimpse of Hanoi. Dare we say that it felt like the San Francisco of Vietnam? Tightly packed housing stood along busy streets that were alongside markets and dance clubs. But I won’t get too far into Hanoi just yet. You see, we had booked a two-day, one-night boat tour of Bai Tu Long Bay, Halong Bay’s less crowded and just as beautiful northern bay.

On our walk back, a tea shop was just opening up. We thought we’d get a little caffeine in our systems (I think at this point it was already 6:30 am). We sat down and ordered some green tea and the lovely people gave it to us on the house. It was such a wonderfully welcoming gesture to us weary travelers that we were a bit stunned. We profusely said thank you to our tea hosts, grateful for small, simple gestures of kindness.

We continued our walk back to the meeting place where our luxury bus was supposed to pick us up. Now it was advertised as ‘luxury,’ but judging by the train situation, we weren’t expecting too much. Except that we were actually pleasantly surprised! This was indeed a luxury bus with cushy seats, plugs for your devices, a TV, and water bottles.

So we cruised in our luxury van to the Hon Gai port where we’d board our junk boat, the Dragon Legend Cruise. After a safety briefing, we were soon enjoying a patio lunch on the boat admiring the magical karsts in Ha Long Bay, a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The karsts, or giant landscapes of limestone, have undergone 500 million years of formation to get this way. And there are over 1600 of them! It was kind of like the water version of Bagan!

Local legend says that the bays were formed when the gods sent dragons down to help protect the Vietnamese people. The dragons soon began spitting jewels and jade which turned into this enormous karsts. These formations helped to block invaders, keeping peace with the people. So the dragons decided to stay. The place where the mother dragon stayed was called Ha Long Bay (dragon descending), the place where the children departed was called Bai Tu Long (place where children descended), and the place where the dragons wriggled their tails was called Bạch Long Vỹ (tail of the white dragon). We cruised through the part where the dragon descended, and right into the place where the children descended.

Our first activity was to go kayaking. So Shiv and I put on our lifejackets and hopped into the double kayak boat. What an incredible view! The karsts loomed protectively on all sides as we kayaked in and out of their formations. Aside from the other people on the ship, we were completely alone. It was a pretty exceptional experience, especially compared to the overcrowded places we had been previously. We cherished the opportunity to explore this amazing landscape on our own and were one  of the last boats back in.

We spent the next hours relaxing in the hot tub (ehhh, more like small tepid water pool) and socializing with the other couples there. Then it was off to a lovely sit down dinner with live, traditional Vietnamese flautists. Because it was our honeymoon, we were even treated to a special cake and shell souvenir. Very nice of the team!

The next day started bright and early with a Tai Chi warmup (which I participated in while Shiv was capturing the sunrise in his mind and on camera). After breakfast, we cruised to Cong Do area to explore the my favorite part of the trip, the Thien Canh Son Cave. So this cave is hidden under the forest top of the karst and inside is full of stalactites that hang mysteriously all around you. I felt like a regular Indiana Jones in here. Our guide said that you could even rent out the place for wedding receptions – omg, why didn’t we know about this a long time ago?!

After the awesome cave explorations, there was some time to just hang along the deserted karst island beach and enjoy the quiet calm. It was our last activity in the bay and it really felt like we could have spent just one more night here. Alas, we got back on the boat and headed back to port, back to our luxury van, and into Yen Duc village in Dong Trieu Province. A Vietnamese water puppet show was in our future.

After a long and nap-filled drive in our luxur-van, we finally arrived to an oddly deserted area with a small theater in front of a small, shallow pool of water. We unceremoniously took our seats and the show began. First with a trio of young singers and then into the water puppet show…that was all in Vietnamese. If we followed close enough, we could get a general sense of what was happening, but by and large we had no clue. Water puppetry goes as far back as the 11th century in Vietnam, so it was nice to see a long-standing cultural tradition. They showed us three different acts, but I think one would have done the trick.

Our trip to Bai Tu Long was certainly one of the highlights of our trip in Vietnam, if not for the beautiful landscapes then definitely for the sheer sparsity of people. Don’t get us wrong, we do love meeting up with people on our trips, but every once in a while, it is nice to enjoy some alone time. Thank you Bai Tu Long for some alone time. You were magical!